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A WOMAN OF FORTUNE 


^ NOVEL. 


By CHRISTIAN REID, 

AUTHOR OF “ARMINE,” “ PHILIP’s RESTITUTION,” “THE CHILD OF MARY, 
“heart of steel,” “the land OF THE SUN,” ETC., ETC. 





c . ^ 





BENZIOER BROTHERS, 

Prmters to the Holy Apostolic See, 

1896. 


Copyright, 1896, 

By BENZIGER BROTHERS. 


CONTENTS 


% 

m 

' ' PAGE 

Chapter I. — “I will leave it behind,” .... 5 
Chapter II. — “The Desire of the Moth for the Star,” 14 
Chapter III. —An Ocean Acquaintance, .... 24 

Chapter IV. — A Collision at Sea, 37 

Chapter V. — “This is our World — for a Week,” . . 49 

Chapter VI. — “I acted on a Caprice,” .... 61 

Chapter VII. — “Some Charges prove rather difficult,” 71 
Chapter VIII. — “I find her adorable,” ... 84 

Chapter IX. — “According to the Fashion of Romance,” 94 
Chapter X. — “Every Door is barred with Gold,” . . 102 

Chapter XI. — “If she were an Heiress!” . . . iii 

Chapter XII. — “I have been tempted,” .... 124 

Chapter XIII. — “These Things are done through 

Friends,” 132 

Chapter XIV. — At the Door of Sant’ Agnese, . . .141 

Chapter XV. — “My Son and I do not agree,” . . 150 

Chapter XVI. — “She could not yield,” . . . .161 

Chapter XVII. — “I want Something,” .... 170 

Chapter XVIII. — “Come and see,” 179 

Chapter XIX. — At the Feet of the Vicar of Christ, 187 
Chapter XX.— “ If he is wise, he will come,” . . 195 

Chapter XXI.— “I am Gerald Tyrconnel,” . . . ?o6 


4 


CONTENTS. 


Chapter XXII. — “ With empty Hands,’' . 
Chapter XXIIL — “Let me help you," 
Chapter XXIV.— “Not of— him,” . 

Chapter XXV. — I did love you,” 

Chapter XXVI. — “I must go,’’. 

Chapter XXVII. — “What shall my Message 
Chapter XXVIII. — “I will go,” 

Chapter XXIX. — “Speak to him,” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER L 

“l WILL LEAVE IT BEHIND.” 

” A ND you will certainly go, Cecil ?” 

It was a question rather than a statement, and 
as such Cecil Lorimer answered it. 

“ Yes,” she said. ” There is no reason why I should 
refuse to do so. It will be an agreeable change in my 
life — a bit of novelty and social adventure. I am rather 
stupid,” she added, with a laugh. ” Perhaps Paris will 
improve me.” 

Her sister, Mrs. Bernard, did not reply for a moment, 
but the expression of her face plainly indicated that she 
dissented from this opinion. Presently she spoke. 

” I do not think any one else would call you stupid,” 
she said. ” And I do not believe Paris will improve 
you. According to my observation, it has, generally 
speaking, rather a contrary effect on people.” 

” You think it will demoralize me ?” asked Miss Lori- 
mer, with another laugh. ” My dear, forgive me if I 
say that such ideas are a trifle narrow. There is no pos- 
sible reason why Paris should demoralize anybody of 
good sense.” 

” Then few of those who go there have good sense,” 


6 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


returned Mrs. Bernard; “for you must acknowledge i 
that it does demoralize a great many of them. Think ; 
of the women who virtually give up their homes and j 
their husbands in order to live there ! — think of the girls 
whose one idea becomes whether they have money or 
beauty enough to buy a husband with a title !“ 

“ And do you think me likely to swell the ranks of 
the last ? I could not very well belong to the first.’’ 

“You ! Don’t misunderstand me so dreadfully. I 
cannot express myself easily, but if you will be patient 
I will try to tell you what is on my mind — what has 
been on my mind ever since you received that letter.’’ 

“Very well,’’ said Miss Lorimer — and she did not i 
laugh again. “ I will be patient, and you shall tell me ' 
once for all what is on your mind.’’ 

She certainly looked patient, but it was the patience 
of one bound by courtesy to undergo something tire- 
some and useless, as she leaned back in her chair, and 
absently stroked the head which a handsome Irish set- 
ter laid in her lap. Her large gray eyes — fine, thought- 
ful eyes, under dark lashes and darker brows — wan- 
dered away over the lawn that sloped in green beauty 
from the veranda where the two ladies sat. People fre- 
quently spoke of Cecil Lorimer’s beauty as “ classical,’’ 
probably because the nobly shaped and poised head, 
the finely-cut features, and lily-like skin, recalled the 
somewhat vague idea of classical loveliness which floats 
through the popular imagination ; but for once the 
often misused term was not inappropriately applied, 
and this for a reason which lay deeper than the outlines 
of her nose or the bearing of her figure. 

The modern mind is somewhat prone to overlook the 
fact that the ancient standard of beauty was an intellec- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


7 


tual one— that the old sculptors never chiselled a type of 
unintelligent loveliness. Behind the brows they moulded 
one feels that no weakness could dwell ; from the lips 
they sculptured it is impossible to imagine that words 
of folly could fall. And herein lay Cecil’s chief claim 
to classical beauty — that hers was a beauty of almost 
severely intellectual character, only redeemed from cold- 
ness by a flash now and then of imperious brilliancy. 
It was evident at a glance that she was a person of 
strong character ; one, too, who had been early accus- 
tomed to habits of independence and command ; but 
there was a frank nobility in the face which promised 
well for that power of self-conquest which does not al- 
ways accompany strength of will. 

Her sister resembled her, as relations often resemble 
one another despite much difference of appearance — 
the noble outlines of one face being softened to grace- 
ful prettiness in the other. Whatever superiority for 
the former this difference implied, Mrs. Bernard would 
have been the first to acknowledge ; for her admiration 
of her younger sister knew no bounds. In her eyes 
there was no one so beautiful, no one so charming, no 
one so clever as Cecil ; and her confidence in that young 
lady’s powers of judgment being of the highest order, it 
cost her no little effort on the present occasion to assume 
the character of mentor. A minute or two passed before 
she spoke again, and then it was with some hesitation. 

“ I am sure,” she said, “you do not believe that I 
think you would find the same attractions in Paris — I 
might say in Europe — that the foolish people do of 
whom we spoke an instant ago ; but there are attrac- 
tions there of a different order for people like yourself, 
and I am certain that if you go in this way^ you will 


8 


A WOMAN OF FORTliNE. 


either never return, or if you return you will never be 
contented to live here again.” 

** What a dark prophecy !” cried Cecil. ” I must 
really ask you to explain it. Why, if I go in this way — 
in other words, if I accept the invitation of the Vicom- 
tesse — will I be more likely to become sensible of such 
attractions than if I went abroad as most people do ?” 

” I think you might see for yourself where the differ- 
ence is,” observed Mrs. Bernard, who disapproved of 
having to explain her meaning. ” People travel abroad 
to see churches and scenery and works of art ; but you 
are going to visit a woman who has lived in Europe for 
thirty years, and who will introduce you into a society 
where your beauty and wealth must make an impres- 
sion, and — and the end will be that we shall never see 
you again.” 

” But what is to become of me ? You have not ex- 
plained that.” 

” You will be married,” said Mrs. Bernard, with mel- 
ancholy decision. ” I am sure of it. The Vicomtesse, 
who successfully bought a title for herself, will never 
rest until she has managed to marry you to some impe- 
cunious count or marquis.” 

” And that is your opinion of me ?” said Cecil. ” If 
it were worth being angry over — but it is not ! I am 
only obliged to you for letting me know exactly how 
foolish you consider me.” 

” O Cecil, you are angry, and how unjust you are ! 
You see, I was right in not wanting to explain myself. 
I knew you would misunderstand me. I think you fool- 
ish ! — well, that, you know, is absurd. But I do think 
that you are very ambitious, and not at all sentimental ; 
and how can I help fearing that you will be led to make 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


9 


some great marriage, that will give you a brilliant place 
in the world, and separate you from us ?" 

“ What an absurd little creature you are, Nelly !” 
said Cecil. “ How is one to reason over such non- 
sense ? But it does seem to me that if there was a 
woman in the world who might be considered apart 
from the possibilities of which you speak, I am that 
woman.” 

“ I cannot see why. It is true that no man has ever 
pleased you yet, but that does not prove that some man 
may not do so eventually. And in Europe it is natural 
that men should be more refined, more attractive than 
with us. They certainly have much more to offer — 
when they have anything at all.” 

” I do not believe that any man in the world has any- 
thing to offer that I could care to accept,” said Cecil, 
decidedly. ” I cannot imagine myself being tempted 
by rank, and that is the only thing I do not possess.” 

” You like power — you must know that you do.” 

” I suppose I do, but it is power which I must win 
and exercise myself. All my dreams are like a man’s : 
of doing some great work, of making myself of use — of 
importance, too, I fear — to a great many people. No 
doubt this is because my dear father filled me with such 
thoughts. How often he said, ‘ Wealth is a great re- 
sponsibility because it is a great power ; never forget 
that, my dear ’ !” 

” Of course it is,” said Mrs. Bernard, as if assenting 
to a self-evident truth. ” But it is a great temptation, 
also ; and when you find what it will purchase for you 
in Europe, I cannot but fear you will be tempted.” 

” Then the best way to relieve your mind will be to 
leave it behind me,” said Cecil. ” That is easily done. 


10 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Very few people here know the amount of my fortune, | 
and I doubt whether the Vicomtesse ever heard of it at i 
all. I am not altogether so obtuse as you imagine : the i 
danger of her making matrimonial plans for me did j 
occur to me, and I determined before you spoke to say i 
nothing of my possessions, and simply enjoy a glimpse i 
of foreign life like any modestly dowered American girl. ' ’ j 

“ But would that be quite — quite right ?” asked Mrs. 
Bernard, hesitatingly. 

“ Why not ? What I possess is my own affair ; whom 
else does it concern ? If I choose to protect myself 
from possible annoyance by simple reticence, have I not 
a right to do so ? When one asks a friend to visit one, ^ 
the invitation is not supposed to depend upon the ! 
amount of his or her income. The Vicomtesse has in- i 
vited not my fortune.” I 

” But think what you will give up in the way of social I 
importance and consequence ! I know it is a wretched, 
mercenary world, but one must take it as it is ; and 
you are not accustomed to being insigi^iiicant.” 

” No,” said Cecil, with a laugh. ” It would certain- 
ly be strange to me to find myself so ; but if the de- 
gree of my significance depends upon outward things, 
and not upon myself, then it will be well to know it. 
So not another word ! My mind is made up, and I 
hope yours is relieved. Are you resigned to my going 
now?” 

‘‘Y — es,” said Mrs. Bernard, rather doubtfully. 

” But I wish we knew more of Madame de Verac.” 

” Ah !” said Miss Lorimer, as she brought the set- 
ter’s beautiful silken ears over to a point on his fore- 
head. ” She IS a little of a mystery ; but if she were 
not so, one element of uncertainty and therefore of 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


11 


pleasure would be taken out of my proposed visit. Did 
you ever see her ? I think you said you did long ago.” 

“ Yes, about twenty-five years ago. I was a very 
small child, of course, but I shall never forget how 
beautiful she was ; the recollection of her is like a pic- 
ture in my mind. She was then in mourning for her 
first husband. He had been minister to some court 
abroad, and I remember hearing mamma say, ‘ How 
Adela affects foreign manners ! ’ She went back to 
Europe soon, and the next thing we heard she had mar- 
ried the Vicomte de Verac.” 

Aprh f' 

” I scarcely know. There was a good deal of gossip ; 
it was said that the marriage was unhappy. But who 
can tell what is the truth ? They certainly never sepa- 
rated, and since his death she has lived in Paris, and 
had very little to do with her country people. I do not 
think she has written to any member of her family for 
years — until her letter to you.” 

” It is a little odd. Why should she write to me when 
mamma was only her cousin ?” 

” They were not like ordinary cousins. Both were 
orphans, and they were brought up together like sisters 
by their grandmother. I have often wondered — when 
I chanced to think of her — that she could let us slip out 
of her life so entirely.” 

” No doubt, as she candidly says, she forgot our exist- 
ence until she saw that photograph of me which the 
Jerninghams — oh !” — her hands suddenly dropped from 
the dog’s ears — ” I did not remember the Jerninghams ! 
They may have spoiled my plan by telling her of my 
fortune.” 

” I don’t think there is the least probability of it. 


12 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


They have been, abroad for years. Mrs. Jerningham 
considers it cheaper and more amusing than living at 
home, and better for the education of the girls.” 

” True. It has been a long time since I saw them — I 
had quite forgotten how long. So there is no danger 
of my importance being betrayed, and I am to go, like a 
crowned head, incog. ! What a nice joke it is, eh, Leo ?” 
Hearing his name, Leo responded with a sharp bark. 

‘‘ There, there ! I did not mean you to enter into the 
conversation. Go, bring my hat, and you shall have a 
walk. I don’t ask you to join us, Nelly” — as the dog ; 
darted away — ” because I know you prefer to wait for ; 
Jack.” 

” I certainly do not share your passion for exercise,” 
said Mrs. Bernard. ” How Leo will miss you when you | 
are gone !” j 

” Dear old fellow ! I am afraid he will,” said Cecil, | 
looking affectionately at the dog, who came back bring- I 
ing her hat. “Jack must give him exercise. It is a !! 
shame for so fine a creature to be spoiled.” 

‘‘Why not return him to his former master? He 
would give him exercise enough.” 

“Mr. Gilbert? I might do that. I do not suppose 
he would mind the trouble.” 

Mrs. Bernard laughed. “ I do not think he is likely 
to mind any trouble iox you.,'" she said. 

Something like an expression of impatient disdain 
came over Cecil’s face. 

“ If you could know how disagreeable such remarks 
are to me, Nelly,” she observed, “ 1 do not think you 
would make them.” 

“ I have said nothing that ought to be disagreeable 
to you,” replied Mrs. Bernard, who felt that the eccen- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


13 


tricities of this young lady should occasionally be 
checked. “ Most people desire to be liked.” 

” I do not share the taste of most people, then,” said 
Miss Lorimer. ” I decidedly object to being liked — in 
that manner.” 

Then she put on her hat, descended the steps, and 
walked away. 


14 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE, 


CHAPTER ir. 

“the desire of the moth for the star.” 

M rs. BERNARD looked after the graceful figure 
with an expression half-amused, half-vexed. 
“Such a girl!” she said aloud. “What is to be- 
come of her ?“ 

Naturally the question remained unanswered, and for 
several minutes silence reigned undisturbed. The 
pretty country house, with its air of mingled simplicity 
and luxury, was quiet and empty behind her ; while in 
front long sunbeams were streaming over turf vividly 
green with the freshness of spring, on flower-beds cov- 
ered with bloom, and on a distant city that lay wrapped 
in golden mist. Not many minutes after Miss Lorimer 
had passed out of sight, however, this quiet was broken 
by a sound of approaching wheels, and a dog-cart con- 
taining two gentlemen came spinning rapidly round the 
drive. As it drew up before the veranda, Mrs. Bernard 
rose. Both gentlemen were on the ground in a mo- 
ment, and one of them came toward her, hat in hand. 

“ How do you do, Mr. Gilbert ?“ she said, very gra- 
ciously. “ lamglad Jack has brought you out with him.” 

“ Thank you, Mrs. Bernard. You are always so kind 
that Jack never has the least difficulty in inducing me to 
accept his invitations,” replied Mr. Gilbert. “ I some- 
times think I should refuse occasionally, if only to in- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


15 


crease my value in his eyes ; but my strength of pur- 
pose is never equal to the effort.” 

” I hope it never will be,” said Mrs. Bernard ; “for 
if it were we should not believe in it as strength of pur- 
pose at all, but as the deplorable fact that you had 
grown tired of us.” 

“ As if such a thing were possible !” said Mr. Gilbert, 
with a most sincere accent. 

He was not at all an ill-looking man as he stood un- 
covered, a gleam of sunshine falling over his ruddy 
locks — of that color which discriminating friends call 
auburn ; his intelligent face lighted up with pleasure, 
and his eyes — apparently small because deeply set, but 
clear and keen — passing by his hostess to scan the open 
windows behind her. Would not a beautiful, stately 
presence that he knew well appear at one of them ? 

Mrs. Bernard saw the glance, and understood its 
meaning at once. 

“ It is a pity,” she observed, “that you did not arrive a 
few minutes earlier. Cecil has just gone to walk alone. 
If you had been here she might have had an escort.” 

“ If you will tell me which way she went, I will take 
great pleasure in following her,” said Mr. Gilbert, 
quickly. 

“ Oh, don’t go rushing away and overheating your- 
self !” said Jack Bernard, coming up. “ Cecil will be 
back presently.” 

“So shall I,” said Gilbert. “Thanks, Mrs. Ber- 
nard,” as she indicated the direction. “ I am a famous 
walker, you know.” 

“ I should think so,” said Bernard, regarding the 
long strides with which he departed. “ But what was 
the good of sending the poor fellow off like that ?” 


l6 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

“ It pleases him,” said Mrs. Bernard, with a laugh ; 
” it will do Cecil no harm, and it gives me an oppor- 
tunity to say a few words to you. Come !” (she put 
her hand into his arm) ” let us walk around the veranda 
while we talk.” 

” This is almost as bad as being sent to take exercise 
with Gilbert,” said Jack, with a sigh. ” Well, what 
is it ?” 

” It is about Cecil. I have tried to dissuade her from 
accepting Madame de Verac’s invitation, but she is de- 
termined to go.” 

‘‘So I supposed,” said Bernard. ‘‘I never enter- 
tained the hope that you would change her resolution. 
When a young lady has had her head as long as Cecil 
has, she generally knows what she wants to do, and 
does it.” 

‘‘ I suggested what you spoke of — the probability that 
the Vicomtesse would try to arrange some marriage for 
her ; and, though she was vexed at my supposing there 
could be any danger on her part, she acknowledged that 
she had thought of the possibility of annoyance that way ; 
so, to prevent anything of the kind, she has determined 
to say nothing of her fortune, but to go — according to 
her own expression — merely like a moderately dowered 
girl.” 

‘‘ Nonsense 1” said Bernard. ‘‘ Does she suppose 
that out of all the Americans in Paris there will not be 
some one who knows the amount of her fortune ?” 

‘‘ That was my thought at first, but on consideration 
I am inclined to think there may not be. After all, 
though there are stories afloat, not many people here 
know the exact amount of the fortune she inherited. 
Her father was very reserved about his affairs, and how 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


17 


can people estimate the value of ranches in Texas and 
silver mines in Mexico and real estate in San Fran- 
cisco ?” 

“ Not easily,” said Bernard, with a laugh. ” Your 
step-father was certainly a great speculator, and all his 
speculations turned out well. He left a fortune of five 
millions, and had he lived a little longer it would have 
been fifty.” 

” Five millions is more than enough for one woman,” 
said Mrs. Bernard. ” I can’t help fancying the Vicom- 
tesse must have heard of it, else why should she have 
written to Cecil ? But if she really does not know — ■ 
Jack, we are strange creatures ! I, who have been un- 
happy over the fear of Cecil’s making some grand mar- 
riage, now feel disappointed at the idea of her not 
doing so. If ever there was a woman who ought to be 
a princess, it is Cecil.” 

Jack laughed. ” She is very princess-like,” he said ; 
” quite enough so under existing circumstances, I 
think. If by a grand marriage you mean a marriage 
with some ruined nobleman, willing to barter his title 
for an American fortune, I sincerely hope she may never 
make it. I had much rather see her marry a good, sen- 
sible, straightforward fellow like Gilbert ; but I suppose 
there is no hope of that.” 

” Not the least. I never saw a girl who thought less 
of marriage ; in fact, it provokes her to hear it spoken 
of. She has all kinds of ideas about the tremendous 
responsibility of wealth, and of doing some great work 
in the world — I don’t know what, exactly.” 

” Nor she,” said Jack, with another laugh. ” It is a 
pity that she is cut out on such original lines. It makes 
her charming, but not safe.” 


i8 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE 


“ How can you say that when she is so clever ?” 

“ The most gigantic mistakes in the world are the 
mistakes made by clever people, and there is no telling 
into what pitfall the cleverness of such a wilful, original 
young lady may finally lead her. I wish we knew more 
of this Vicomtesse de Verac.” 

“ So do I. I have felt all the time that I wished it 
were possible to obtain some information about her.” 

” I have just thought of a person who perhaps can 
give it,” said Bernard, reflectively. ” You’ve heard me 
talk of Ralph Craven ?” 

” Your friend who has been abroad so long ? Yes.” 

” Paris is rather more his headquarters than any- 
where else, I think — at least I generally write to a stand- 
ing address there, and he answers from Russia or 
Egypt, as the case may be. So I think it likely he may 
know something of Madame de Verac, and he will 
also be able to keep an eye for us on Mademoiselle 
Cecil.” 

” But how can he keep an eye on her from Russia or 
Egypt ?” 

” That could hardly be expected, but he may be in 
Paris ; and if so, he is trustworthy in every point of 
view — sensible, fastidious : a man of the world, and not 
at all likely to fall a victim to her charms.” 

” Then he ought to suit Cecil exactly. I am so glad 
you thought of him ! Pray write at once, but don’t 
mention her fortune even to him.” 

“Why should 1? It will not concern him at all. 
Confound the fellow ! If he cared more for money it 
would be better for him : he would not be wasting his 
time and his talents as he is doing,” 

” What is he doing ?” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


19 


“ Nothing, as far as I am aware. He is one of 
the class of people who find America too crude for 
their refined sensibilities. But now I beg to suggest 
that although this promenade is exceedingly delight- 
ful, I should like to go and change my coat before 
dinner. ” 

“ Cecil is right,” said Mrs. Bernard, dropping his 
arm. ” One is much more highly appreciated unmar- 
ried than married. Think of Mr. Gilbert’s delight at 
being able to walk with her 

” Poor fellow, yes ! How warm he must be by this 
time !” said Jack, sympathetically. 

The gentleman thus commiserated was meanwhile 
unconscious of being in any degree an object for pity. 
He had overtaken Miss Lorimer without difficulty, and 
been greeted very kindly. Though aware of his ad- 
miration, she wholly ignored it, and by this ignoring, 
repressed it more effectually than by any possible sever- 
ity ; while there can be no doubt that the consciousness 
of its existence was pleasant to her. She would have 
been surprised had any one convinced her of the exist- 
ence of this pleasure, but she would none the less have 
missed the homage had it been withdrawn. It was an 
atmosphere to which she had been accustomed all her 
life, and to which she only objected when it became 
too palpable. That men should admire, should even 
from afar off respectfully adore her, was very well ; but 
that any of them should draw near enough to propose 
to marry her, filled her with a sense of repulsion and 
indignation. ” How dare he !” was always her first 
haughty thought, and it is safe to say that no man 
whose wooing she rejected ever returned to encounter 
rejection again. 


20 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


She was sometimes reasonable enough to ask herself 
by what possible right she felt in this manner — why it 
was she conceived her dignity outraged by proposals 
over which other women waxed exultant as proofs of 
power, or regretted as suffering they had no alternative , 
but to inflict. Such questioning was vain ; the feeling ' 
was too instinctive to be reasoned away, nor was it in any 
degree due to the circumstances of her life. It was no 
doubt owing to these circumstances — to her great gifts 
of wealth and beauty — that it had been brought into ^ 
prominent exercise ; but it would have existed in the 
same force had her position been wholly different, since 
its spring lay deep in a nature too proud to rate its value 
by extraneous things. 

Mr. Gilbert, wiser than many of those who had gone 
before him in the perilous path of admiration for Miss 
Lorimer, knew exactly how hopeless was any expression 
of the feeling which he entertained for her. He was 
too sensible to deceive himself for an instant, and he ' 
often laughed in not very mirthful fashion over the folly 
which made him continue to emulate a moth, and singe 
his wings in the vestal flame that allured him. “ But 
I am not like other men,” he sometimes remarked to 
himself. ” A hopeless passion is the only kind of a 
passion possible for me, because I should have so poor 
an opinion of the woman who could be satisfied to find 
her ideal — and I would not want a woman who did not 
have an ideal — in nie^ that she would fall from her ped- 
estal at once.’ ’ 

In this whimsical manner he consoled himself for the 
fact that nothing could be imagined more unlikely than 
that Cecil Lorimer would find her ideal in him ; and, 
secure in the belief that no other man was any nearer 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


21 


his goddess than himself, he was content to worship 
from afar — the more readily since she was a woman 
whom no man of intellectual culture could fail to enjoy 
meeting on other grounds than those of mere sentiment. 
If in her somewhat crude youth it was not possible to 
pay her the famous compliment paid long ago to a noble 
woman, and say that “ it was a liberal education to have 
loved her,” it was possible — at least Gilbert felt it possi- 
ble — to have been led to many high sources of interest 
and pleasure through loving her. 

These two, therefore, were very good friends, not- 
withstanding the fact that it was not entirely friendly 
regard that looked out of Gilbert’s eyes, and that his 
companion was too thoroughly a woman not to be 
aware of this. When Leo’s welcome told her whose 
was the quick step along the shaded road behind her, 
she turned with a cordial smile. 

“Mrs. Bernard encouraged me to come,” said Gil- 
bert. ” I hope I don’t disturb you.” 

” Not at all,” she replied. ” I am very glad to see 
you, and Leo speaks for himself.” 

“He certainly does. Hold your tongue, sir!” — for 
Leo was still uttering short barks expressive of delight. 
” What a beautiful dog he has become !” 

” Has he not ? Did you think he would be so pretty 
when you gave him to me ?” 

” Oh, yes ; for I knew his parents— splendid import- 
ed dogs both. It is almost a pity so fine a dog should 
not be trained for sport.” 

” Then take him and train him, will you not ? Oh, I 
know what you will say” — as Gilbert looked vexed at 
having let his thought unconsciously escape — ” that you 
gave him to me for my pleasure. Well, he has given 


22 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


me a great deal of pleasure ; but now that I am going 
away, I should like for you to take him and keep him, 
if you will. Nelly and Jack care little for dogs.” 

” Of course I will take him and keep him if you wish 
it,” said Gilbert, seriously. ” But I am sorry to hear 
that you are going away. May I ask where ?’ ’ 

” Only to Paris, which seems very near at hand in 
this age of the world, although I have never been 
there.” 

” When do you go ?” 

” Not for a week or two, so you will not be called 
upon to take Leo home with you to-night. But one 
always feels like making one’s arrangements for depar- 
ture as soon as a decision is taken — at least I do.” 

”1. fancy you are always ready for anything,” said 
Gilbert. ” There is a soldierly quality of promptitude 
about you that one does not often see in a woman.” 

” That is because I was trained by a man. My father 
taught me early how important promptitude is in life, 
and how irritating the lack of it may be.” 

” A wise teaching, but many women would not have 
profited b}^ it.” 

” I think I am more of a man than a woman,” said 
the girl, laughing. ” I have always thought so. I have 
a passion for men’s work, and I don’t like women’s work 
at all. If 1 were a man my ambition would be bound- 
less. I should never rest until I was prime minister of 
some great country, or general-in-chief of some great 
army.” 

“You would permit your friends to salute yo7a from 
afar, I hope,” said Gilbert, laughing too, yet thinking, 
with the painful sense of remoteness which is familiar 
to all who have loved hopelessly, that she looked fit to 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


23 


rule a country or to lead an army, woman though she 
was. “ I cannot help fancying,” he added involun- 
tarily, ” that you will play some such part in the world, 
though it will be as inspirer rather than doer.” 

” I am afraid that I am not humble enough to care to 
achieve through others,” she said. “Is it not a fortu- 
nate thing that, having such a vaulting ambition, I 
should not possess the opportunity for it to overleap 
itself, as vaulting ambitions are likely to do ? Disap- 
pointment must be a terrible thing in such a case.” 

“ And to fall, worse than never to have climbed.” 

“ But what would become of the world if nobody 
cared to climb ?” 

“ That is hard to say, for there are always people glad 
to climb at any possible risk. The world is rather in 
need of a few more quiet people like myself, who prefer 
that others should have both the labor and the glory of 
such undertakings,” 

“ I really think you are the most enviable person I 
know,” said Cecil. “ You are so thoroughly content 
with your lot, so perfectly sure of gaining all that you 
want from life. You are to me an embodied essay on 
the wisdom of moderate desires.” 

“ Yes,” said Gilbert, not without a secret sense of 
amusement at the unconscious irony of her words. 
“ My desires are, generally speaking, very moderate ; 
and if by chance I fix my eyes on something beyond my 
reach, I do not deceive myself with false hopes of ever 
gaining it ; but, recognizing its excellence, I am glad 
that the world is richer for possessing it — though I am 
not, and never can be.” 


24 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER III. 

AN OCEAN ACQUAINTANCE. 

TOW,” said Cecil, ” is not this delightful? And 

-E ^ do you not feel better already ?” 

She spoke to a lady who leaned on her arm as they 
stepped together on the deck of the great ocean steam- 
er, which, with wings spread to the favoring breeze, 
was cleaving her way through the outspread liquid plain 
toward the Old World. The long decks were filled 
with people, for the smooth sea and bright sunshine 
had brought out all but the most incorrigible in sea- 
sickness. Apparently, however, Miss Lorimer’s com- 
panion was of the latter order ; for as they emerged, 
she put up her hand to shut out the sight of the danc- 
ing, glittering waves, which Cecil found so exhilarat- 
ing. 

“Oh,” she said, “I really cannot stand it! You 
must let me go down again.” 

‘‘No, no,” said Cecil, inflexibly. ‘ Now that you 
are here, you must stay. 1 will make you very comfort- 
able, and you need not look at the waves if you don’t 
like. But where is Mr. Marriott ? He ought to be here 
to arrange your chair.” 

She looked around, but the person whom she sought 
was not in sight — neither among the energetic prome- 
naders of the deck, nor the loiterers at the taffiail. As 


A WOMAN OP FORTUNE. 


25 


she hesitated an instant, a gentleman standing near 
stepped forward. 

“ Can I be of any assistance ?” he asked, courteously. 

“ Thanks, yes — ^^if you will be so kind,” Cecil replied. 
” Please look among those deck chairs” — pointing to a 
row folded up, standing on end — ” for one that has 
‘ Marriott ’ or ‘ Lorimer ’ written on the back, and place 
it for this young lady.” 

” My dear Cecil, I can never stay !” remonstrated the 
latter. 

” Oh, yes, you can !” Cecil answered, with a cheerful 
positiveness. ” That is one of our chairs,” she added, 
as the gentleman who had volunteered his services drew 
one from the ranks. ” Now if you will kindly open it ?” 

He not only opened, but found a secure, sheltered 
position for it ; and when a maid came up with her 
arms full of rugs and wraps, he assisted very deftly in 
arranging them for the pale girl, who, finding remon- 
strance useless, resigned herself, and sank into the seat 
provided for her. 

” Now I am sure that in a little while you will feel 
better,” said Cecil, covering her up. ” If you do not, 
of course we must submit to let you be miserable in your 
own way ; but even for misery I think this is better 
than that close state-room.” 

Then, having folded the soft wraps all around the 
passive figure, she turned to the gentleman who had 
come to their assistance. 

“We are very much obliged,” she said, graciously. 
” You have been very kind.” 

'' I am happy to have been of use,” he answered, lift- 
ing his hat. As he walked away, he smiled a little — a 
smile that was for Miss Lorimer’s princess-like tone. 


26 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


It was neither haughty nor patronizing, but simply that 
of one who condescended a little in addressing her fel- 
low-creatures — a tone that might have been offensive 
had it not been so evidently unconscious. But, recog- 
nizing this unconsciousness, the man whom she had just 
addressed thought that the manner suited her appear- 
ance — the appearance which he had admired during the 
two or three days they had been on shipboard together. 
He was alone, and not very sociably inclined, so he had 
the more leisure to observe the beautiful, stately girl, 
who had indeed been followed by many eyes beside his 
own, as she walked up and down the deck during the first 
day or two out, when she was almost the only lady visible. 

He was himself a man at whom most women would 
have glanced twice, and to whom they might have been 
gracious in a different fashion from Cecil’s. Tall and 
slender, with a firmly-knit and admirably-proportioned 
figure, there was a look of distinction about him which 
was quite unmistakable. The stamp of race was set 
upon him from the top of his well-carried head to the 
ends of his slender yet muscular-looking hands. Un- 
der favorable circumstances he would have been a 
handsome man, but just now he looked worn and ill ; 
his refined features were sharply outlined, the pallor of 
his skin was perceptible even through the bronze which 
the sun had laid upon it, and there was a shadow of sad- 
ness or care in his dark, sombre eyes. 

He found his own chair, and established himself with 
a book in a quiet corner ; but it was impossible not to 
glance now and then toward the invalid whom he had 
aided in establishing, and the graceful, elastic figure 
that hovered around her — now sitting down for a few 
minutes, then taking a turn or two on the deck ; but 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


27 


whether sitting, standing, or walking, ever full of life, 
movement, ease, and grace. In truth, as Cecil was at 
that time remarking, the air of the ocean had upon her 
a most stimulating effect. 

“ It is so strange to see you lying there pale and in- 
different,” she said to her friend. ” This air acts upon 
me like a divine nectar and tonic. I do not feel as if 
pain could exist in the world.” 

‘‘Do you not?” observed her listener, languidly. 
‘‘ Then I only wish I could give you my sensations for 
a time.” 

‘‘ Poor Grace ! I wish I could take them,” was the 
quick answer. ‘‘ If I only could, you would be on your 
feet in five minutes, enjoying all this glorious day and 
scene.” 

‘‘ And you would be lying here ? I cannot fancy 
that. I am sure your will would be strong enough to 
overcome even a rebellious stomach.” 

Cecil laughed. ‘‘You are getting better,” she said. 
‘‘ Until I brought you up on deck you had not energy 
enough to be sarcastic. But indeed I always felt great 
sympathy with the character in one of the eeiie stories 
of Poe, with which I used to curdle my blood when I 
was a child, who declared that ‘ man does not yield him- 
self to death save through the weakness of his own fee- 
ble will.’ ” 

‘‘ Then I shall expect you to be a female Wandering 
Jew.” 

‘‘ Am I so very strong in will ? Every one accuses 
me of it ; but it is not an amiable or a desirable char- 
acteristic.” 

‘‘ It is not unamiable — in you,” said Grace Marriott. 
” Most wilful people are very selfish, but I do not think 


28 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


you would insist upon having your own way if it would 
injure any one else.” 

” I hope not,” said Cecil, seriously. ” But one can- 
not be sure. One is always liable to be betrayed by the 
defects of one’s qualities. I suppose I ought to culti- 
vate humility and deference to the opinions of others, 
but nature is very strong in me.” 

” Nature is strong in most of us,” said Grace ; ” but 
perhaps” — with a glance at the spirited profile beside her 
— ” stronger in you than in most people. If it is true that 
we can gain happiness and peace only by subduing na- 
ture, I am sorry for the struggle that is before you.” 

Cecil glanced at her with a slightly startled look. 
” The struggle !” she repeated. ” Is there a struggle 
before me ? I am not sure that I care to subdue my 
natural impulses. So long as they do no harm to 
others, why should I ?” 

” The answer to that would lead us very far,” said 
her companion, ” and I am hardly in condition either 
to argue or expound. You remind me of an untried 
soldier, my dear Cecil — all bravery, ardor, and self-con- 
fidence. I am afraid the last, at least, must be a little 
shaken. But here comes John — in time to put a stop 
to my prophecies.” 

There was a great contrast between the pale, delicate 
speaker and the stout, good-looking man on the sunny 
side of middle-age, with his general air of prosperity 
and satisfaction with life, who now came up. But they 
were brother and sister, nevertheless, though with a wide 
gulf of years between them — one being the eldest and 
the other the youngest of a large family — and a wider 
gulf of different tastes and sympathies. Sensitive, intel- 
lectual, artistic to her finger-tips, Grace Marriott was 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


29 


now on her way to Europe to complete her studies in 
art, while her brother was crossing over to visit his fam- 
ily — his wife finding it more entertaining to live abroad 
than in America, and having an excellent excuse in the 
education of the children ; while Mr. Marriott was him- 
self one of the obliging husbands who spend their days 
in the accumulation of means to support an establish- 
ment in Paris or Dresden, where they are received as 
guests once or twice a year. 

“ So, Grace, you are out at last, are you ?” he said as 
he came up. “ I hope you are feeling better ? I knew 
you would once you were on deck. You ought to have 
let me bring you up yesterday.” 

” Yesterday was too rough,” said Cecil. ” She would 
not have enjoyed it. But I am sure she is better for 
being out to-day.” 

“You brought her up, did you ?” said Mr. Marriott, 
regarding the speaker with an admiring smile. ” I 
would have been on hand if I had known ; but I fancy 
you were the best person, after all. You were made to 
carry everything before you, Miss Cecil.” 

” So Grace has just been telling me,” said Cecil. 
” But I looked for you when we came on deck. I 
wanted you to arrange the chair and settle her comfort- 
ably. /could not leave her to do it, and Maria has not 
got her sea legs at all.” 

” I should think not,” said Mr. Marriott, with a laugh 
— for Maria (Miss Lorimer’s maid) had been so far con- 
spicuously helpless. ” I went to the smoking-room, 
and I stayed a little longer than I intended,” he added ; 
” but of course you had no difficulty in finding some- 
body to arrange things for you.” 

” Oh, not the least !” said Cecil, carelessly. ” There 


30 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


is always a man to do such things ; but one prefers not 
to accept services from strangers.” 

“That depends on the stranger,” observed Grace. 
” This one was very kind, and evidently a gentleman.” 

‘‘Without doubt,” said Cecil; ‘‘but one prefers an 
acquaintance. Now, Mr. Marriott, what do you think 
of a turn up and down the deck ?” 

Mr. Marriott replied that he would be delighted, hav- 
ing the usual restlessness of masculine humanity on 
board ship, and being not at all averse to the pleasure 
of such a companion. So, after inquiring if there was 
anything Grace wanted, or was likely to want, and hav- 
ing received an assurance in the negative. Miss’ Lorimer 
walked away with him. 

They had not been gone very long before a pair of 
observant eyes perceived that Grace’s position had be- 
come less pleasant. Her chair had at first been placed 
in shadow, but the sun in travelling toward the meridian 
had found her out, and shone down upon her with un- 
comfortable brightness. She looked around when she 
became conscious of this, but neither her brother nor 
Cecil was in sight. Then she pulled a veil over her 
face, but the glare was still disagreeable. To rise, how- 
ever, was impossible : she could not have trusted her- 
self on her feet for an instant without support, apart 
from the fact that she was wrapped like a mummy in 
folds from which she could not have disembarrassed 
herself without assistance. She closed her eyes, there- 
fore, and resigned herself to the position — but only to 
be startled the next moment by a pleasantly-modulated 
voice saying over her head : 

‘‘ Pardon me, but I think you are uncomfortable. 
Shall I not move your chair ?” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


31 


She looked up to see the same dark, clear-cut face 
that bent over her before. Its kindness and courtesy 
were alike unmistakable. 

“You are very good,” she said. “ I do find 
the glare disagreeable ; but it is so troublesome 
to rise, and my friends will be here in a short 
time.” 

“ There is no reason why you should rise,” said the 
gentleman. “ I can draw your chair into the shade 
without disturbing you.’' 

He laid his hand on the back as he spoke, and drew 
it, evidently with ease, a few feet toward the shaded 
part of the deck. 

“ I hope that did not discompose you,’’ he said as he 
paused. 

“ Not at all,’’ answered Miss Marriott, smiling. 
“ This is vastly more pleasant. Thank you very much. 
How kind of you to have observed that the sun had 
found me out !’’ 

“ Oh, I felt myself responsible for your position since 
I had arranged it.’’ Then, after a brief pause, and en- 
couraged by her pleasant manner, “ I hope you are feel- 
ing better ? ’’ 

“ Yes,’’ she replied. “ I must acknowledge that 
being on deck has helped me. I fought against com- 
ing, but my friend brought me up whether I would or 
no.’’ 

The stranger smiled a little, as he had smiled at 
Cecil’s tone in thanking him. He was not surprised by 
this report of her arbitrary proceedings, but he made 
no comment — only remarked that it was always best in 
case of sea-sickness to remain on deck as much as possi- 
ble. “ Especially when the weather is fine,” he added ; 


32 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ for in what sailors call ‘ dirty weather,’ ladies at least 
must stay below.” 

” I hope we shall have no such weather,” said Miss 
Marriott, anxiously. 

” Oh, the Atlantic is certain to give us at least one 
rough tossing before it lets us go,” he answered. ” At 
this season we are certain of nothing but uncertain 
weather, you know.” 

” And icebergs. All our friends had something cheer- 
ing to say about them before we started.” 

“It is too early for any serious danger from ice, I 
think. The bergs have hardly set out on their travels 
from the Arctic regions yet.” 

” Apart from the danger, I should like to see some of 
them,” said Grace, with the artist shining in her eyes. 

” They are really not much worth seeing,” answered 
her companion, ” except in extraordinary cases. If you 
ask .our captain, I am sure he will tell you that there is 
nothing he would not rather see.” 

” Oh, of course !” she replied, with a laugh. 

By such easy and commonplace steps these two were 
advancing toward acquaintance, when Cecil and Mr. 
Marriott returned. They were astonished to find that 
Grace’s chair had shifted its position, until they per- 
ceived the young man who stood talking to her. As 
they approached, Grace said : 

“ Are you surprised to see that a mummy can move ? 
But the sun invaded my corner, and this gentleman 
came to my assistance a second time, and drew me into 
the shade.” 

“Very kind of you,” said Mr. Marriott, turning to 
the stranger, who on his part bowed and walked away. 
He did not wish these people to fancy that he desired 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


33 


to make their acquaintance. But Mr. Marriott followed 
him. “ My sister has been twice indebted to you,” he 
said. Then he opened a passenger-list in his hands. 
” When people are shut up on shipboard together they 
should be sociable,” he added. ” This is as good as an 
exchange of cards. Here is my name ; will you point 
out yours ?” 

It was impossible to resist this frank friendliness, and 
indeed the other had no wish to do so. He indicated 
his name, and Mr. Marriott read it aloud. 

” Tyrconnel. Ah, yes ! A fine name — historical as- 
sociation and all that. Proves Irish descent.” 

” Naturally,” was the reply. ” I am an Irishman.” 

” Ah, yes !” said Mr. Marriott again. ” Curious this 
thing of national types,” he went on the next moment. 
” I see now that you could not be anything else.” 

When he rejoined his sister and Cecil, he explained 
his meaning more fully. ” Any one who is at all cos- 
mopolitan in his knowledge, can generally tell national- 
ity at a glance,” he said. ” I have observed that man 
^everal times — there’s a remarkable distinction about 
him — and I could not quite decide what he was. He 
has a foreign look, but 1 saw that he did not belong to 
the Continent, and he has too much grace and fire about 
him for an Englishman. But the matter is plain now — 
he. is an Irishman, and every one knows that there is no 
finer type of gentleman in Europe than the Irish gen- 
tleman.” 

Mr. Marriott cultivated his new acquaintance after 
this, and when Cecil came on deck in the afternoon, for 
a promenade before dinner, he had further information 
respecting him to give. 

” I advise you to talk to that man,” he said. ” I 


34 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


think he would interest you. He is very cultivated, and 
has seen a great deal of the world ; he is on his way 
from Australia to Ireland now.” 

” Then our voyage is only the end of a long journey 
for him,” observed Cecil. “ But one cannot talk to a 
man who does not give one the opportunity to do so.” 

” ril provide the opportunity,” said Mr. Marriott. 

Not many minutes later he perceived the man of 
whom they spoke standing by the taffrail, looking west- 
ward, where the sun was going down in the tossing 
waves with a good deal of sunset pomp, and the long 
track of foam vrhich the vessel left behind her was gild- 
ed with its parting rays. He started a little when Mr. 
Marriott, with Cecil on his arm, suddenly drew up near 
him. 

” Promise of many more charming days in that,” said 
the former, with an easy nod toward the sunset. 

“lam not sure of it,” answered the other, lifting his 
hat to the young lady. “It is not exactly a sky that 
sailors like, and I observe that the breeze is freshening 
in the northeast. I fear we shall have bad weather 
soon.” 

“You seem to be something of a sailor yourself,” 
said Cecil, looking at him. 

” Oh, no,” he replied. ” I have only the familiarity 
with the sea of one who has been on it a good deal.” 

” I have never been on it for a long voyage before,” 
she said ; and I do not feel now as if I could ever 
again be content to be away from it. In fact, I want to 
take the longest voyage practicable — to go around the 
world.” 

“Very easily done in these days,” said Mr. Marriott. 

” But hardly worth doing unless with sufficient 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


35 


time,” remarked their new acquaintance. ” One 
should take two or three years for such a journey as 
that.” 

‘‘Two or three years!” repeated Mr. Marriott. 
‘‘ Well, if you wanted to take out naturalization papers 
in every country on your route, perhaps so. But I 
could do the thing — ” 

‘‘ In eighty days ?” asked Cecil, smiling. 

‘‘ I should not care to attempt that^ but in ten months 
with ease.” 

‘‘ I suppose it would be very easy to put a girdle 
around the earth in ten months,” she said. ‘‘ But, you 
see, my delight would be in the voyage, not in the end 
of it ; so I would like to prolong it as much as possible. 
I wish there was some way to prolong this voyage ! 
Why are people so anxious to reach the shore, where all 
their cares lie in wait for them ? I should think that 
every one would be glad of the respite of being at sea, 
and would like to prolong such a period of rest.” 

‘‘ You forget that some of us have people on the shore 
whom we are very anxious to see,” said Mr. Marriott ; 
‘‘ and the rest are in a fever to take up again those 
cares of which you talk, as if you could know anything 
about them !” 

Cecil lifted her head with the haughtiness which was 
always a natural impulse with her. What did this man 
know of her, that he should venture to take such an 
easy and familiar tone ? 

‘‘ If I knew nothing of human cares I should be a very 
extraordinary person,” she said, coldly. ‘‘ But here 
come the sailors to shift the sails. It is all a mystery 
to me, but I like to watch it.” 

While she watched it, the man leaning against the 


36 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


side of the ship watched her — the changing expressions 
of the beautiful, noble face — and wondered a little what 
the cares could be which she was anxious to prolong 
her voyage to escape. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE, 


37 


CHAPTER IV. 

A COLLISION AT SEA. 

I T is almost unnecessary to say that Miss Lorimer’s 
slight impulse of haughtiness had given a wrong 
impression, and that she was not anxious to prolong the 
voyage in order to escape her cares, of which Mr. Mar- 
riott was right in supposing that she had few if any. 
But her idle wish was destined to be gratified in a man- 
ner as unexpected as it was unwelcome to most of those 
on board. 

The prophesied rough weather arrived before morn- 
ing. By midnight the gale was upon them, and the 
rolling and pitching of the ship rendered sleep difficult 
to all but the most accustomed sailors. Few passen- 
gers appeared at breakfast the next morning, and of 
these only two or three ladies. Among them, however, 
was Miss Lorimer, who had resolutely struggled through 
the difficulties of a toilet, and made her appearance, to 
be greeted with applause by Mr. Marriott, who was ap- 
plying himself to his breakfast with very slight diminu- 
tion of his usual appetite. 

“Delighted to see you!” he said. “I hardly 
thought that even your pluck would be equal to an 
appearance this morning.” 

“ It is rather hard to keep one’s feet,” said Cecil, 
laughing. “ But I could not endure to remain in the 


38 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


State-room. Poor Grace ! She is prostrate in her berth 
again.” 

” She has plenty of companions in misery to-day,” 
answered Mr. Marriott. ” You see how empty the 
saloon is.” 

Cecil glanced around, encountered a pair of daik 
eyes, and after an instant’s hesitation bowed to her 
acquaintance of the previous evening. 

” Yonder is the man who prophesied this horrid weath- 
er,” she said ; ” and he looks as if he were enjoying it.” 

” He’s a good sailor, I fancy,” observed Mr. Mar- 
riott. ” He has been pretty much all over the world. 
We were talking in the smoking-room last night, and he 
was telling me a good deal about Borneo.” 

” What has taken him to such places ? Love of ad- 
venture or amusement ?” 

” He did not say, but I infer that his object was to 
make money. He spoke of the possibilities of fortune 
in those countries, but said that a man must give the 
best years of his life to make it.” 

” And he apparently has not given the best years of 
his” — with another glance at the face opposite. ” It 
seems a very pitiful thing to do — to give one’s best years 
just to accumulate money,” she added after a moment. 

” Hm!” said Mr. Marriott. ” It is very easy to de- 
spise money if one is so lucky as to have it ; but if one 
has not got it, then one has no choice but to give one’s 
life to making it.’ ’ 

” Don’t think I am so foolish as to despise money,’’ 
said Cecil. “What I mean is that it seems a pitiful 
thing to make that the supreme end, if one has been 
fitted for other work ; and this man looks as if he had 
intellectual capacities.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


39 


“ Intellectual capacities without means behind them are 
generally a snare and a delusion,” replied Mr. Marriott. 

” Perhaps so,” said Cecil, who perceived the futility 
of argument. ” But tell me, what are the prospects for 
to-day ? Is there no hope of getting on deck ?” 

” None for you. I’m afraid. It may be possible for 
you to get to the top of the companion and put your 
head out — that is all.” 

So much as this was accomplished after breakfast, 
and Cecil was standing at the top of the companion 
with her head out of the door, surveying rather discon- 
solately the scene of wet decks, gray, wild sea, and driv- 
ing rain, when Tyrconnel came up the broad, zinc-cov- 
ered steps, and, pausing, steadied himself with one 
hand, while with the other he took off the little cap 
that fitted closely over his dark hair. 

” I am afraid you find this a very disagreeable out- 
look,” he said, sympathetically. 

“It is horrid,” she answered, looking at him re- 
proachfully. “ Your bad weather has come, and we 
are all prisoners.” 

“ I am sorry,” he said, smiling at her tone j “but 
the prophet, you know, is not accountable for the evil 
he foresees.” 

“ Foresee something better, then. Tell me when this 
will be over.” 

“ I hope it may not last more than twenty-four hours, 
but it is impossible to tell positively.” He paused an 
instant, then added : “ It is very unpleasant, but those 
who are not seasick may endure it with philosophy.” 

“ I am thinking of those who are sea-sick more than 
of myself,” said Cecil. “ Poor souls ! they are so mis- 
erable, and will be miserable as long as it lasts.” 


40 


A WOMAN OP FORTUNE. 


“ Yes, but since one has not the least power to relieve 
them, they must bear their misery, as we all have to 
bear incurable evils in the course of our lives.” 

Cecil looked at him a little curiously, and he caught 
her glance quickly. 

“ That does not mean that I am hard-hearted, but 
only that I am philosophical for others as well as for 
myself,” he said. 

” I was wondering,” she observed, rather dryly, ” if 
you were as philosophical for yourself as for others.” 

” I don’t think I fail in it,” he said, quietly. ” What 
can’t be cuied must be endured, and I never could see 
the use of wasting one’s strength in complaint.” 

She was silent for a minute. Indeed the noise of the 
wind and sea made conversation difficult. But pres- 
ently there was a slight lull, and since he was still stand- 
ing, holding the opposite side of the door to her own, 
she answered his last speech : 

” I wonder if there are many things that cannot be 
cured ? I have not much sympathy with resignation. 
I always feel as if there must be a means to cure any- 
thing, if one had but energy enough to apply it.” 

He smiled again as he looked at her. Her sentiments 
were so entirely in keeping with her appearance — with 
the high courage, the self-confidence, and the ignorance 
of the stern side of life which everything about her indi- 
cated. He hardly knew how to answer them, having 
himself a very intimate knowledge of obstacles which 
no energy could bend, misfortunes which no exercise of 
will could overcome. 

” I think,” he said at length, ” that you forget how 
many things there are in the world for which there is 
no cure. Not to speak of death, there are many minor 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


41 


evils which one can only endure — the loss of a limb, the 
loss of fortune, or a storm at sea, for example.” 

” Sometimes resolution can save even the loss of a 
limb,” she said. ” I know a man who was wounded 
during the war, and the surgeons wanted to amputate 
his leg. He refused absolutely to allow them to do so, 
and kept a pistol under his pillow, with which he threat- 
ened to shoot the first man who attempted it. They 
declared that he would die, but he got well, and has his 
leg to-day.” 

The young man laughed. ” I see that you are pro- 
vided with examples to prove your theory. But you 
must acknowledge that that was an exceptional case. 
If every one followed your friend’s example, we should 
have many deaths from mortification. He took the 
risk, I presume ; but, under ordinary circumstances, it 
is not a risk which a man has a right to take.” 

” I only gave that as an example of what can be done 
sometimes by a determined person to avert misfortune,” 
she said. ” It seems to me that people are too prone to 
sit down under calamity and accept things as inevitable. 
A little resolution — ” 

Just then her companion, who was looking seaward, 
laid his hand on her arm, drew her back quickly, and 
closed the door. 

‘‘There is a wave coming,” he said, ‘‘which would 
drench you.” 

It broke over the deck as he spoke, with a mighty 
sound, and dashed against the closed door. The great 
ship quivered like a living thing under the strong buffet 
of the sea ; and Cecil, with a sense as if everything 
solid were slipping from under her, found herself cling- 
ing to the hand that had drawn her back. It was only 


42 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


for a moment, however. She recovered herself and her 
self-command as the ship recovered from its plunge, 
and relinquished the living support for the side of the 
door again. 

“ The worst of a storm at sea is that it makes one 
very helpless,” she said when she could speak. ” But 
it was kind of you to be so quick. Now can we open 
the door again ?” 

“It would hardly be safe,” he answered. ” The gale 
is evidently increasing, and we may expect these waves 
at recurring intervals. I think, perhaps, you had better 
let me take you below.” 

” Oh, I cannot give you that trouble. Mr. Marriott 
said he would come for me presently.” She looked at 
the ladies’ cabin just opposite the recess in which they 
stood. ” I think I will go in there,” she added. ” One 
has a view of the decks and the sea from the windows. 
That will be better than being shut up below.” 

” If you will take my arm, then — you cannot walk 
without support.” 

It being incontestable even to herself that she could 
not, she accepted his support to the cabin — usually a 
place sacred to convalescent sea sickness, but to-day 
without any occupants whatever — where he established 
her on one of the sofas, with a recommendation to be 
careful lest a lurch of the ship should throw her 
off. 

” And now,” he said, ” if you would like me to tell 
Mr. Marriott where you are, I am on my way to the 
smoking-room.” 

” You will find him there, no doubt,” said Cecil. 
“Just mention, please, that you left me here; for I 
should not like to remain for an indefinite length of 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


43 


time, and I suppose I could not get down that compan- 
ion-way alone.” 

” I hope that you will not make the attempt,” said 
her new acquaintance. 

Then he bowed and left her ; and as she saw him let 
himself out of the door that he had closed a few min- 
utes before, and pass rapidly along the deck past her 
mist-blurred window, she felt that the difference be- 
tween a man and a woman, on shipboard at least, was 
very unfair. 

Mr. Marriott soon made his appearance, and took her 
below, where she resigned herself to confinement and 
dulness. The gale did not diminish as the day went 
on, and night closed upon them heavy, dark and murky. 

After dinner the few passengers able to be out of their 
state-rooms were scattered over the saloon, engaged in 
such occupations as the rolling of the ship rendered 
practicable. Cecil was sitting at one of the tables try- 
ing to read, and fighting the qualms that assailed her 
now and then, when there came a sudden shock — a 
crash that vibrated through every timber of the ship, 
and brought every man in the saloon to his feet, pale 
and breathless. Then came a fearful, grinding, crush- 
ing noise, as if every screw and plank were being torn 
apart ; and through it all the trampling rush of many 
feet on the deck above was heard even over the noise of 
the storm. 

” We have had a collision !” ” We are going to the 

bottom !” were exclamations uttered on all sides, min- 
gled with ciies of terror and dismay. None of these, 
however, came from Cecil’s lips. She, too, had 
risen to her feet, but she stood pale and silent, 
clutching the table to steady herself, with a vision be- 


44 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


fore her eyes of the wild, stormy sea outside. Were 
they, indeed, going down into those terrible waters ? 
She saw them so vividly that she hardly saw any- 
thing else, until a voice, spoke to her, and she looked 
up into a pair of dark eyes that had already grown 
familiar. 

“ Keep quiet,” said their possessoi, in a calm tone. 
” I am going to find out what is the matter, and I will 
return as soon as possible to let you know.” 

There was something in his face which filled her with 
a sense of confidence in his courage and coolness. She 
extended her hand suddenly with a gesture of appeal. 

” If you find that it is serious,” she said — ” if we are 
likely to go down — will you come and help me to the 
deck ? I could not bear to stay heie, and Mr. Maniott 
will have his sister to care for.” 

” I promise,” he answered, in a tone which said more 
than the words. ” Do not fear. Trust in God — and 
pray.” 

The next instant he was gone in the general move- 
ment toward the deck, while Cecil sat down again and 
waited, apparently unmoved by all the babel of panic- 
stricken voices around her. She knew that he would 
return, and she had been calmed by his voice as by the 
touch of a strong hand. His words were still ringing 
in her ears. ” Trust in God — and pray,” he had said, 
like one who utters involuntarily the deepest thought of 
his soul ; and she found herself repeating the words, 
” Trust in God.” Here — now — face to face with death, 
did she tiust in Him ? She hardly knew. Her belief 
in Him had been so conventional, her trust in Him so 
vague, that she felt like one who in direst need tries to 
convert a shadow into a reality, and her soul was too 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


45 


candid for her to deceive herself into fancying that she 
could do so. Pray ? Well, she had offered a lip hom- 
age all her life — set forms of words with more or less 
sense of reverence attached ; but none of them came to 
her now, or seemed worthy of remembrance in this crisis 
of peril, when life was perhaps measured by moments. 
She put her hands over her eyes, while her inarticulate 
thoughts tried to frame themselves into an appeal to the 
God who to her, as to the Athenians of old, was truly 
“ unknown.” 

Presently she was roused by a voice, and, looking up, 
she saw one of the ship’s officers endeavoring to make 
himself heard. He was trying to quiet the tumult and 
reassure the terror stricken passengers. ” Owing to the 
darkness,” he said, “we have had a collision with an 
iceberg, and the ship is somewhat injured, but not dan- 
gerously. We have just made an examination which 
assures us of this. At present we are in no danger.” 

Then he escaped from the storm of questions ready to 
be poured upon him, and the relieved yet still appre- 
hensive passengers had no resource but to talk to one 
another, and to assail with their inquiries the chief 
stewaid, who now made his appearance. 

But Cecil sat perfectly quiet, as if obeying a com- 
mand. Now that it was in a manner over, she felt that 
the shock had not been less to her than to the ship. 
Although her courage and her self-control had not 
failed, she had tasted, as it were, the bitterness of death 
in those wild, dark waters raging without ; for the first 
time in her life she had realized the awfulness of what 
lay beyond the portals of mortality, and she felt herself 
shaken in every fibre. She remained, therefore, quite 
still and very pale, with her eyes cast down, so that she 


46 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


did not observe the man who again approached her, 
until he spoke. 

“I am glad to tell you, Miss Lorimer,’' he said, 
“ that, as far as can be ascertained, we are not in dan- 
ger. You have heard, no doubt, that we have had a 
collision with an iceberg. The ship is much injured, 
but, thanks to her water-tight compartments, is not dan- 
gerously disabled.” 

She looked up at him with calmness, but he saw in 
her eyes how deeply she had been moved. 

” I am grateful,’' she said after a moment. ‘‘ It has 
been a narrow escape, has it not ?” 

” Very narrow. Had not our speed been slack- 
ened, from the captain’s knowledge of danger, the ship 
would have driven against the berg with much greater 
force, and would have been so seriously damaged that 
she must have gone down.” 

” But since she is disabled in a degree, is there no 
probability, with this sea, of our going down yet ?” 

” The officers think not. Of course, if the gale in- 
creased, our situation would be rendered more perilous 
by the accident. But it is subsiding.” 

They were silent for a moment, then Cecil said : 
” You were kind to return so soon to tell me this. I 
hope you understand why I made that appeal. It 
seemed so terrible to die here/ I felt that I would 
rather face any fate on deck.” 

” I had already decided what I should do for you if 
the ship were going down,” he said. “One values 
one’s own life at such times only for the use one can 
make of it for others. And I confess I feared the 
worst.” 

Despite herself, Cecil shuddered. ” It would have 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


47 


been terrible,” she said, “to go down into that black 
abyss of raging water. I never before realized how 
awful death might be. I have always fancied that I 
should be brave — that I should not fear it.” 

” Courage does not mean insensibility to danger,” he 
answered. ” If the worst had come, I am sure you 
would have been brave in meeting it. But the soul that 
did not quail before the face — the unexpected and ter- 
rible face — of death would hardly be a soul at all.” 

Something in his tone and manner impressed her 
deeply. She looked up into two dark, grave eyes that 
seemed accustomed to regard dangers. 

” I suppose,” she said, abruptly, ” that when you 
told me to trust in God, you felt that trust your-self ?” 

“Surely yes,” he answered. “Does that seem to 
you strange ? Do you not think that, 

‘ Woe being come, the soul is dumb that crieth not on God ’ ?" 

“ If it has not cried on Him at other times, would 
there be much avail in crying then ?” she asked. “ And 
it seems not only a presumptuous but almost a con- 
temptible thing to fly to God in the hour of danger, 
after having forgotten and ignored Him when we felt 
no need of help.” 

He smiled at her tone. “ We are all more or less 
guilty of such forgetfulness,” he answered. “ But our 
best hope is that God will not think us presumptuous 
for calling on Him in our need. Where else can we 
turn ?” 

Cecil did not answer for a moment ; then she said, 
gravely : “I should not think much of a friend who for- 
got me in his prosperity, and came to me only in his 
need. I might be glad to relieve the need, but I should 


48 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


respect him very little. So God, I am sure, can respect 
very little those who cry to Him only when danger 
comes.” 

“ He will certainly not reward them as He will more 
generous souls,” said Tyrconnel. “But our weakness 
is our best excuse.” 

” I am afraid it is not an excuse that I like to plead,” 
she said. ” But I must thank you for making me think 
of these things, as well as for your kindness. Will you 
add to the last now by taking me to poor Grace ?” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


49 


CHAPTER V. 


“this is our world — FOR A WEEK.” 

ND so Cecil had her wish ; for it was known the 



x~\. next day that the ship was so much disabled that 
the captain was obliged to put into Halifax, and that 
the passengers would be sent from there either to Liv- 
erpool or back to New York, if they could not wait 
until the necessary repairs rendered the steamer able to 
complete her voyage. 

When this announcement was made, there was some 
chafing against the delay on the part of those who were 
anxious to cross in the shortest possible time ; but the 
majority of the passengers were sufficiently grateful for 
their escape to bear the delay with philosophy. As for 
Miss Loiimer, she laughed when she was told of it. 

” I feel like Jonah,” she said — ” as if I ought to be 
cast overboard, I don’t suppose that my desire that the 
voyage should be prolonged had anything to do with 
the accident, but I have a sense of guilt, nevertheless.” 

” I hardly suppose that your desire had much to do 
with it,” said Mr. Marriott ; ” but I would not advise 
you to accuse yourself in the hearing of some of the 
passengers. They might try the Jonah business, for 
they are not pleased at the prospect before us.” 

” They are very ungrateful, then,” said Cecil. ” They 
ought to think of where they might be at this moment.” 


50 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ Men don’t think of such things any longer than 
they can help,” observed Miss Marriott, who did not 
like to think of them herself. 

The great steamer, with her smashed bowsprit, was 
therefore put about for Halifax, and most of those on 
board resigned themselves with patience to the pro- 
longation of their voyage. Happily for their comfort, 
the weather moderated, the sea grew smooth, and the 
run was quickly and safely made. By the time they 
reached Halifax, Tyrconnel seemed quite one of the 
Marriott party ; for they all adopted him cordially into 
their favor, and Mr. Marriott was delighted to be re- 
lieved of some of his duties as escort. If another man 
was willing to place chairs, to bring up shawls and 
rugs, and make himself generally useful, Mr. Marriott 
was only too happy to allow him to do so, while he took 
his own ease in the smoking-room. 

He was not in the smoking-room, however, when 
they entered the Nova Scotian harbor, but was stand- 
ing on deck, with his attention fastened on the town 
that lay before them, when Tyrconnel, whose eyes were 
elsewhere, suddenly turned to him. 

“We are in luck,” he said. “Yonder is the Allan 
steamer for England. I feared we should miss it. We 
must make our application for passage at once, for she 
will be able to receive only a limited number of passen- 
gers.” 

“ And it will be first come first served,” said Mr. 
Marriott. “ Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll attend to 
the matter immediately. You are coming with us, of 
course ?” 

” Yes. I must get on as quickly as possible, if I 
should be forced to take a berth in the steerage.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


51 


But fortunately there was no such necessity. Owing 
to the promptness of their application, good though 
confined quarters were obtained for all the party ; their 
effects were transferred from one vessel to the other, 
and when everything was satisfactorily settled there was 
still enough of the day left in which to see all that was 
worth seeing in Halifax. This speedily resolved itself 
into the view from the citadel ; for the town, despite 
its magnificent situation, is of the most commonplace 
description. The rough streets and shabby houses were 
forgotten though, when the little group, having climbed 
the hill which the fortress crowns, stood on its green- 
sward, and looked out over the vast expanse of the At- 
lantic. From this height and at this hour — for the sun 
was touching the horizon — the sea wore an aspect of 
perfect calm and a tint of lucid, exquisite color, as it 
stretched away to the luminous sky, into which it softly 
melted. 

“ How charming !” exclaimed Cecil. “ I am glad 
that our way lies over this great plain, and not away 
from it.” 

” 1 am glad that we are going to Europe,” said 
Grace, who stood beside her ; ” but I confess I dislike 
this deceitful ocean, that looks so peaceful now and can 
be so dreadful. What if we should meet more icebergs ?” 

” Are you afraid of them?” asked Cecil. “I think 
they have done their worst to us, and it has not been 
very bad.” 

” Our captain would not agree with you,” said Mr. 
Marriott, looking down on the vessel they had quitted, 
which presented a sad sight, with her headwork carried 
away, her bow in splinters, and her forecastle deck 
torn up. 


52 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ I think our captain is too good a sailor not to agree 
with Miss Lorimer/’ said Tyrconnel. “He is thor- 
oughly aware how much worse the accident might have 
been.” 

“ We might have been food for fishes at this mo- 
ment,” said Grace. “ Of course one knows that, and 
it does not tend to reassure one very much in going 
forth to meet more icebergs.” 

“ I shall never choose this season for going abroad 
again,” said Mr. Marriott. “ But after one has got so , 
far, it seems a pity not to go on.” ' 

“Would anything induce you to go back?” asked '. 
Cecil. “ For my part I feel twice as much eagerness to 
pursue the voyage as I felt to set out on it. Difficulty *1 
and peril only fill me with the desire to overcome ' 
them.” 

As she uttered the last words she met Tyrconnel’ s 
eyes, and their expression was so unconsciously curious 
that she colored quickly. A minute or two later, when 
Mr. Marriott moved away, together with Grace, she 
turned to him. ^ 

“ Do you think me very absurd to be talking of diffi- 
culty and peril?” she asked, abruptly. “But, after 
all, the most prosperous and commonplace life — 1 grant 
that mine is both — must occasionally learn what they 
are, and I do not believe that I am mistaken in feeling ; 
that they nerve my resolution rather than weaken it.” 

“ One need only look at you to be sure of that,” he j 
answered, quietly. “You give me the impression — if 
you will pardon me for saying so — of a courage that is 
dauntless, and a resolution which it would be hard for 
any obstacles to bend. Yet”— his voice changed a lit- 
tle — “ there are obstacles in life before which one must 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


53 


bend, difficulties over which it is impossible to ride 
rough-shod. 1 was wondering, when you spoke a mo- 
ment ago, how your courage and resolution would serve 
you if you should be brought face to face with these.” 

He looked away from her as he uttered the last words, 
out over the ocean, toward the liquid sky-line beyond 
which the Old World lay. Cecil was quick to receive 
impressions, and she felt that he was looking straight 
toward such obstacles and difficulties as those of which 
he spoke. A shadow came into his eyes, deepening 
their darkness, and his lips set themselves firmly to- 
gether. ” He has some great trouble,” she said to her- 
self, with a keen sense of interest. ” I wish I could ask 
him what it is.” 

This being impossible, she answered his last speech 
after a slight hesitation. ” There must, of course, be 
many difficulties in life which I have not only never 
known, but which I am probably unable to imagine ; 
and there are complications which are harder and more 
trying than difficulties ; but is there any possible situa- 
tion in which courage and resolution would not help 
me ?” 

He looked quickly back at her again, and perhaps it 
was a reflection of her smile that seemed to banish the 
shadow from his eyes. It was not easy, indeed, for 
eyes to be shadowed while they regarded anything so 
fearless and so beautiful as Miss Lorimer appeared at 
this moment — standing in the sunset glow of sea and 
sky, with its light on her face, her head uplifted with 
the proud self-confidence which characterized her, and 
her deep gray eyes full of radiance. 

“No,” he said, replying to her question, “there is 
certainly no situation in which courage and resolution 


54 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNF. 


cannot help one. But you are right in thinking that 
there are complications worse than any dangers or ob- 
stacles — situations in which one is driven to hurting 
others or being untrue to one’s self and one’s highest 
conceptions of duty. Of course if one thought only of 
one’s self, all would be very easy. There is a direct- 
ness of aim, a singleness of purpose in selfishness that 
often settles such problems —brutally perhaps, but none 
the less effectually. But if one cannot put aside the 
thought of others — if one must admit their claim to con- 
sideration — one may find one’s self in situations where 
courage is indeed possible, but not of much assistance.” 

Cecil did not answer for a moment. She stood look- 
ing at him, feeling as if his words had opened before 
her a vista of perplexity and complication altogether 
strange to her experience. She was trying to realize to 
herself the situation thus presented, when she perceived 
that Mr. Marriott and Grace were returning toward 
them, and she had only time to say, quickly : 

” It seems to me that in such a case courage would 
be of great assistance. It would enable you to be true 
to your highest conception of duty, even at the cost of 
wounding others. And it must require a great deal of 
courage for that.'' 

” A great deal indeed,” he said, with a short sigh. 

But he seemed to leave the weight of care of which 
he had thus been led to speak on the high, wind-swept 
hill, where the flag of England floats and the guns of 
England frown over the Atlantic surges, and to be in 
the best of spirits as they walked down through the 
steep, uneven streets, and, shaking the (literal) dust of 
Halifax from them, went on board their new ship. 

When Cecil came up on deck next morning they were 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


55 


well out at sea, and the coast of Nova Scotia was fading 
like a dream behind them. She seemed radiant with 
pleasure. 

“ How delightful it is to be at sea again !” she said 
when Tyrconnel met her. “ There is such a glorious 
freshness about the ocean ! 1 should not care if our 

voyage were going to last a month.” 

” Nor should I,” he answered, with a very sincere 
accent. ” So we, at least, will n*ot regret the fact that 
this ship is by no means one of the greyhounds of the 
ocean. We shall be a week in reaching the other side.” 

” So much the better,” she said. ” We don’t know 
what annoyances and disappointments may lie in wait 
there. We will enjoy the sea, and not think of the land 
we have left, or of that to which we are going.” 

The young man looked at her with a quick light in 
his eyes. “You are wise,” he said, “This, then, is 
our world — for a week.” 

It was a week of pleasure to these two, at least. The 
weather was fine, except that once, when they neared 
ice — sailing indeed for twenty-four hours through the 
midst of great bergs — it grew intensely cold. But not 
even this breath of the frozen North could depress Cecil. 
Her vitality seemed proof against any lowering of the 
temperature. She enjoyed the icebergs as she enjoyed 
everything else, laughed at Grace’s trepidation, went 
with the captain on the bridge to see the sun go down 
behind the great mountains of floating snow, and was 
the wonder of all the ladies, the admiration of all the 
men on board. 

Admiration was an atmosphere to which she was well 
accustomed, however, and to which, as has been already 


56 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


said, she did not object, unless it became too pro- 
nounced in character. Of that there was no danger at 
present. The man of whom she saw most was one in 
whom her confidence increased with her knowledge. 
And her interest in him — in his adventurous life (which 
yet had not marred his refinement), in his present 
troubles, and in his unfolding character — grew as the 
days went on. It was an interest fully shared by Grace 
Marriott. Indeed, with the latter it took the form of 
vivid curiosity. As they sat on deck together, she led 
the conversations in directions likely to afford as much 
information with regard to him as possible. But, al- 
though he was ready to talk, and did talk most enter- 
tainingly of the different parts of the world in which he 
had been — and he seemed to have been almost every- 
where — there was a striking lack of the personal ele- 
ment in his narratives and reminiscences. He had been 
in the Southern Hemisphere for several years, but was 
now recalled to Ireland by family affairs which demand- 
ed his presence at home. So much she learned, but no 
more. Reticence was either a strongly marked charac- 
teristic or a carefully cultivated habit with him ; and 
the temptation to talk of himself, to which most people 
to readily yield, was apparently no temptation to him 
at all. 

The monotony of days at sea is apt to make them 
pass rapidly if they are at all pleasant, and it seemed to 
Cecil that the evening came very soon when they were 
told that they would make Fastnet Light by daybreak. 
In the general expression of satisfaction, her silence was 
probably unobserved ; and she did not express her sen- 
timents until Tyrconnel found her after dinner standing 
near the wheel-house, watching the long track of foam 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


57 


in the vessel’s wake as it stretched away to the horizon. 
The sun had gone down, but the lengthening twilight 
still held the world in a soft spell of beauty, while the 
moon hung in mid-heaven waiting for the hour of her 
empire. As Tyiconnel approached, she turned her 
head and smiled. 

“I am enjoying all that I possibly can of our last 
evening at sea,” she said. ” To-monow we shall be 
in sight of land, and it will no longer seem like the 
ocean.” 

” Yes, our voyage is nearly ended,” said Tyrconnel. 
He, too, leaned against the rail, and looked westward 
along the ship’s broad pathway. Perhaps he was think- 
ing of the days and hours he had spent on that track — 
so soon, so utterly to be effaced, and which no human 
eye would ever find again in the wide waste of tossing 
water. He was silent so long that Cecil finally glanced 
at him. Then she saw that the shadow which had been 
for a time lifted had fallen again over his face, and that 
he looked like the man she had first met, not like her 
companion of the last eight days. 

” ‘ Everything that ends is short,’ ” she quoted, soft- 
ly ; ” and pleasant things shortest of all. In spite of 
the iceberg, our voyage has been very pleasant to me, 
and I am sorry that it is over.” 

If she meant to rouse him from his abstraction, she 
succeeded. He turned and looked at her, but the 
shadow was still in his eyes as they rested on her face. 

” Do you remember,” he said, ” the evening on the 
other ship^ when we were standing like this watching 
the sunset, and you said that you wondered why people 
wer e so anxious to reach the shore, where all their cares 
lay in wait for them — why they were not more glad of 


5g 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


the brief respite of being at sea ? After that I made a 
resolution to throw my cares aside, and enjoy the voy- 
age as if it were not to end. Thanks to your sugges- 
tion — thanks to you in every sense — I have done so. 
But now the end has come, and, looking back, I have 
been trying to balance the good and ill. Was the pleas- 
ure worth the end ? Will the memory of it be recom- 
pense for knowing that it is over ? These are the ques- 
tions I have been asking myself.” 

” One might ask such questions of every pleasure and 
every respite from care,” said Cecil. ” One must be 
sorry when a pleasant thing is over ; but, notwithstand- 
ing the regret, it is good for us to have had the pleas- 
ure. It will be good for you to have laid your cares 
aside, even though you must take them up again.” 

” If the cares were all !” he said, speaking as if to 
himself. Then he went on quickly : “I do not know 
how to thank you for the kindness which has made this 
voyage all that it has been to me. I was just thinking 
that it is like that track of foam across the ocean— a 
pathway which I shall never find again, but which will 
remain always in my memory as luminous and as en- 
chanted as it looks now.” 

Cecil’s heart began to beat a little faster. After all, 
had her confidence been misplaced, and was the in- 
evitable end of admiration and homage at hand ? She 
glanced at him quickly, almost apprehensively, but the 
sadness of his face reassured her. He had looked away 
from her again, and was watching the track of foam as 
it was lost to sight in the far, golden distance. 

” I hope that you will also remember your own kind- 
ness,” she said. ” If acknowledgments are to be made, 
they should not be all on your side. We owe much 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


59 


to you. I shall never forget that night of the col- 
lision.” 

” Nor I. But I did nothing.” 

“You had the will to do much. I recognized that, 
and was grateful. If I am ever shipwrecked, I shall 
hope that you may be among the ship’s company.” 

I He smiled, as she meant that he should. 

I “If you are ever to be shipwrecked, I could ask noth- 
i ing better than to be with you,” he said. ” But I fear 
i that there is no such fortune in store for me. We talk 
; often of the world being a small place, but it is large 
I enough to admit of many different paths, which never 
5 cross. The people whom we wish to meet are those 
whom we do not meet. I have a presentiment that we 
shall never meet again after we part to-morrow.” 

Cecil did not answer for a moment. In fact, she was 
startled by her own sensations of regret, and by a burn- 
ing inclination to say, ” It will be your own fault if we 
do not meet again. A man can do what he pleases.” 
But her favorite doctrine of the power of resolution to 
overcome all difficulties could plainly not be preached 
in this case. Besides, it suddenly occurred to her how 
little she knew of this man, of his circumstances or posi- 
tion, of the nature of the troubles that so evidently 
weighed upon him. To express a desire that they 
should meet again was, therefore, impossible. After a 
short pause she said, lightly : 

” I have no faith in presentiments. I am sure that 
when I make my journey around the world, we shall 
meet somewhere — on shipboard very likely, where we 
can stand and watch another track of foam just like 
this. Meanwhile shall we go and look for Grace ?” 

4c * * * * 


6o 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


The next afternoon it was a rather sad trio that stood 
on the deck of the ship as she lay in Queenstown har- 
bor, and watched the small tug which carried their 
friend ashore. Even Mr. Marriott was depressed. 

“ I have made many pleasant travelling acquaint- 
ances,” he observed, ” but never one whom I liked so 
much. I hope that I shall come across him again some 
day.” 

” He was delightful,” said Grace, regretfully. “ How 
we shall miss him ! The ship seems absolutely empty 
now that he is gone. But we shall certainly meet him 
again some day ; don’t you think so, Cecil ?” 

Cecil fluttered her handkerchief in answer to a fare- 
well signal from the pier, which the tug had by this 
time reached, and then answered Grace by one clear, 
decisive word — 

” No.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


6i 


CHAPTER VI. 

“l ACTED ON A CAPRICE.” 

I N all the world there is nothing brighter than a 
spring day in Paris, when the gay city seems thrill- 
ing with life, when the flowery foliage is at its freshest, 
when the fountains are flashing diamond spray in the 
sunshine, when the streets and shady avenues are 
thronged with people, and the whole air is filled with 
sounds of life and pleasure-making. 

On such a day Madame la Vicomtesse de Verac sat in 
her salon, through the open windows of which came a 
soft murmur suggestive of the overflowing life of the 
great city. She had evidently been a beauty once, this 
faded, elegant woman ; and she was still beautiful 
enough to charm the gaze that rested on her. All the 
fine grace of feature, the soft fairness of complexion, 
and the gentle brightness of laige brown eyes remained, 
notwithstanding the touch of time — which was suffi- 
ciently perceptible. But it was a tender touch, as if 
passing lightly over a thing so delicate and lovely. 
Roses had vanished from the cheeks, but their smooth- 
ness knew no lines such as care and trouble write. In- 
deed these foes of the human race had scarcely touched 
this graceful head. ” Adela will make a great success 
in the world,” a wise woman once said in her girlhood. 
” She will never suffer through others, for she has not 
heart enough ; and she has so much beauty and shrewd- 


02 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


ness that she will do the best for herself always, in a 
practical point of view.” 

Never was prophecy more completely fulfilled. Peo- 
ple passed like shadows across the life of this woman, 
outwardly so charming, inwardly so selfish. If they 
could be of use to her, she laid hold upon and used 
them ; if not, she let them go with, gentle indifference. 
Only in relation to her interests had they reality or 
value in her eyes. She shed a few decorous tears when 
her first husband died, but she had the consciousness 
of having fulfilled her duties toward him to his entire 
satisfaction ; and he fulfilled his^ in leaving her rich as 
well as free. Her second marriage opened to her a new 
world, in which she proceeded at once to conquer her 
place ; and by the time that she was left a second time 
a widow, she had achieved a social success which ren- 
dered her independent of further assistance. There 
was nothing, therefore, to tempt her to a third venture 
into the uncertain waters of matrimony. Offers were 
not lacking, but she declined them all — preferring to 
enjoy her freedom and the social distinction she had 
won, without encountering fresh risks. 

But, though she refused to marry, the Vicomtesse did 
not deny herself the admiration and homage of men. 
This was an incense which had never failed her at any 
time of her life, and which was as necessary now as 
ever. Clever men she specially liked, and when she 
wanted a friend or an adviser, it was to such a man that 
she always turned. One who had no doubt of his own 
cleverness, and whose estimate of himself the world was 
prepared to endorse, sat before her now, listening with 
an attentive air while she talked. More distinguished- 
looking than handsome, he was yet not deficient in 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


63 


good looks ; his keen face was at once intellectual and 
attractive, while his air, his manner, every detail of his 
toilet, indicated the man of the world, familiar with the 
highest phases of civilization. This was Mr. Philip 
Craven, the friend of Jack Bernard. 

“ And why,” he was saying, ” do you begin now to 
I distrust your wisdom ? You must have had a good rea- 
son for taking such a step.” 

” Ah ! who can tell ?” she answered. ” Who knows 
what are good reasons ? Mine, I confess, are very like 
caprices. I chanced to see a photograph of this girl, 
and she has a striking face. A desire grew upon me to 
see the original. And, then, I have felt for some time 
that I need a companion — a girl, pretty, well-bred, in 
whom I could interest myself, who might make a social 
success, and whom I might marry well. You will laugh, 
perhaps, but that is a fancy which pleased me.” 

“I do not laugh,” replied Craven. ” I find your 
fancy very natural and charming. I am sure you have 
acted wisely.” 

” I am not at all sure of it,” said the Vicomtesse, 
with a sigh. ” But I acted on a caprice, and I must 
abide by the consequences. If she should not be pre- 
sentable, I will leave Paris, go to some quiet place in 
the country, and send her home after a month or two 
with an abundance of chiffons. But as the time ap- 
proaches for her arrival, I begin to wish that I had 
never seen her photograph. The uncertainty of what 
she may be, the fear that I have brought a dreadful in- 
fliction upon myself, makes me very nervous. I had 
hardly written when I began to hope that she would 
decline to come. But no : she wrote that she would 
sail from New York almost immediately.” 


64 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ Courage !” said her companion, who could not for- 
bear a smile at the melancholy tone of the last an- 
nouncement. “ Believe that you have summoned a 
companion who will prove all that you could desire.” 

” You speak as if you knew something of her,^’ said 
the Vicomtesse, with a look of surprise. ” Yet I have 
not even told you her name.” 

” I can tell it to you, however. She is Miss Lorimer. ” 

” But what does this mean ? Do you know her ?” 

” Not at all. But I know her brother-in-law, who is 
one of my oldest friends. On my arrival in Paris I 
found a letter from him speaking of this young lady, 
and saying that she would soon be with the Vicomtesse 
de Verac. Now, Bernard is not only the best of fel- 
lows, but he is incapable of making a serious mistake 
about another person ; and, from the tone in which he 
discourses of Miss Lorimer, it is evident that she must 
possess unusual claims to distinction of one kind or an- 
other — though he does not specify what they are.” 

” Indeed !” said Madame de Verac, with an air of 
interest. ” She is very handsome — no doubt she is 
what they call in America a belle. It is a vulgar form 
of social success, but the only one of which they know 
anything. It means only the admiration and attention 
of men, and is more likely to spoil than to improve a 
girl. It lowers her tone, and makes her unfit for what 
is meant by social success here.” 

” Bernard says that she is a little spoiled and wilful, 
but intimates that this is owing to her having had the 
world pretty much at her feet. I inferred that she 
might be an heiress as well as a beauty.” 

” Oh, no,” replied the Vicomtesse, confidently. ” I 
do not suppose that she has anything extraordinary in 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


65 


the way of fortune. It is not essential to success in 
America, you know ; though, of course, it is a desirable 
gilding to other charms, there as elsewhere.” 

” Then why should Bernard emphasize his fears of 
matrimonial snares for her ? He must know that wealth 
is absolutely essential to enable an American to marry 
well over here.” 

” I doubt if he knows it. These things are little 
understood in America. And so he fears matrimonial 
snares for her ? What absurdity ! Should she have a 
good dot^ I may be able to arrange a marriage for her, 
if she wishes it, and if she does not hope for too much ; 
but to fancy that snares would be spread — ah, the folly 
of the provincial imagination !” 

“You cannot tell,” said Craven, with a smile, ” what 
elements for success this young lady may possess. Who 
knows ? You may have the pleasure of presenting an- 
other Madame de Verac to Paris.” 

To his surprise the Vicomtesse lifted herself and 
looked at him with almost indignant reproach. 

” I did not think the suggestion of such an idea would 
come from you!'" she said. “Do you imagine that I 
could desire the last De Verac to make no higher alli- 
ance than that ?” 

Even to one who thought he knew the speaker well, 
this was a little startling. Craven was aware that, like 
most Americans who have married rank in Europe, 
Madame de Verac was an aristocrat of aristocrats ; but 
he hardly expected her to scornfully repudiate the idea 
of an alliance between one of her own family and the 
representative of the name she had taken in marriage. 
He had yet to learn that the ties of blood were in her 
case weak compared to those she had formed from as- 


66 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


sociation, and that had she been born De Verac she 
could not have felt more pride in the name — a greater 
wish that it should obtain every possible prestige. 

“ I must beg pardon for having expressed myself ob- 
scurely,” he said, after an instant’s pause. ” I did not 
mean literally another Madame de Verac, but simply 
one who might prove worthy of emulating your success. 

” It is I who should beg pardon for stupidity, then,” 
returned the Vicomtesse. ” I misunderstood you the 
more readily because it has occurred to me that I might 
be suspected of some such intention. But any one who 
knows me must know how near to my heart it is that 
Armand should make a great marriage. He is the head 
of the house, he is in the flower of his youth — hand- 
some, distingu/, clever. He can aspire to any one, and 
he must, he will, make a great alliance.” 

Mr. Craven lifted his brows a little. ” There is but 
one drawback,” he said. ” The Comte de Verac is 
most charming ; but if he is not already ruined in for- 
tune, he is considered to be one of those who are on the 
high-road to that end.” 

” Ah ! what will you ?” said the Vicomtesse, with an 
expressive Gallic gesture. ” His tastes are those of his 
rank and age. Presently he will range himself, and all 
trouble will be over. One must not press the point too 
soon. My opinion is respected in the family,” she add- 
ed, with a slight smile, ” because the assurance that he 
will inherit my fortune renders him a bon parti^ let his 
extravagance be what it will.” 

Her companion regarded her for the second time with 
an expression of genuine surprise ; then in a tone of 
deference, though with the freedom of an old friend, he 
said : ” But, Madame, pardon me if I remind you that 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


67 


in giving such an assurance you overlook not only your 
own relatives, but the probability that one so young and 
beautiful as yourself may yet desire to form other ties.” 

” JVTy own relatives are nothing to me,” she an- 
swered. ” I have lost sight of them altogether, and, as 
far as I am aware, they are all well provided for ; while 
Armand de Verac is the head of the family with which 
I am identified by marriage. My own comparative 
youth and beauty are beside the question. I shall never 
marry again — if that is what you mean.” 

” I fear that I am a selfish wretch. I rejoice to hear 
you say so, because in such a case I feel that you would 
belong more to one and less to all of your friends.” 

” I am surprised that you could entertain such an 
idea,” she said. ” What have I to gain by marriage ? 
I have all that I ask of life, and a change could only be 
to lisk unknown dangers. I shall never think of it.” 

” What can one do but bow to such a decision ?” said 
Craven, smiling. ” To be your friend is almost enough 
to reconcile one to the hopelessness of ever becoming 
your husband.” 

‘‘ Perhaps if I were twenty years younger, it might 
not be altogether hopeless for you,” said the Vicom- 
tesse, with a caressing smile. ” But, happily for both 
of us, there can be no such commonplace ending to our 
pleasant friendship. Now go and meditate gratefully 
on that.” 

If Mr. Craven was meditating on the fact thus pre- 
sented to his consideration, when he emerged from the 
great porte-coch'^re of the hotel in which the Vicomtesse 
had her abode, it certainly brought a smile of amuse- 
ment to his lips ; but a smile which the lady whom he 


68 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


left could hardly have resented, so slight yet so humor- 
ous was it. In truth, he was smiling at himself as much 
as at her ; for his fancy was greatly amused by the posi- 
tion of sentimental friend and confidential adviser which 
he occupied. It was not in the least an onerous posi- 
tion, for the Vicomtesse was too wise to be exacting ; 
and although any civilized man must have felt bound to 
burn a little incense before the shrine of so fair a god- 
dess, the more delicately this was done the better the 
goddess was pleased. Such an offering was a small 
price to pay for the friendship of a woman so beautiful, 
so charming, so spirituelle j and Craven, who admired 
her most sincerely, had no difficulty in rendering the 
homage demanded of him. 

Just now, however, he had other matter for thought 
and amusement. “ By Jove,” he said to himself, ” if 
Bernard could only know ! What is it he says ?” He 
paused as he spoke, drew a letter from his pocket, 
opened it, turned over the pages until he found this 
passage : 

” What do you think of being invested with discre- 
tionary powers as guardian of a young lady ? Don’t be 
too much startled ! This as it stands is, of course, 
only a jest ; but I really want you to be good enough 
(provided that you are in Paris, or likely to be there) 
to look a little after my sister-in-law. Miss Lorimer, who 
will be there in a few weeks from this date. She goes 
to visit her cousin, the Vicomtesse de Verac, of whom 
you may or may not know something. On this side of 
the water very little is known of her, and that little is 
not altogether of a complimentary nature ; so that it is 
decidedly against my wishes and advice that Cecil goes. 
But ‘ a wilful woman ’ — you know the rest of the prov- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


69 


erb. Now, you will agree with me that it is a risk for 
any girl to place herself under the social wing of a 
woman of whom she knows little beyond the name ; but 
this risk is particularly serious in Cecil’s case. It would 
be a great misfortune for her to be placed even tem- 
porarily in a false position of any kind ; and indeed the 
mere possibility of such a thing makes her friends so 
uneasy that I have thought of the expedient of invoking 
your aid, and begging you to watch over her — as a 
guardian under the rose. Though you may be dis- 
mayed at such a prospect, you will not feel it an un- 
! pleasant responsibility. It would be difficult to find a 
i more attractive person than Miss Lorimer ; and if you 
were not proof against feminine fascinations, I might 
fear that I was not doing you a good turn in impos- 
I ing this charge upon you. That you will require all 
your tact in fulfilling it, I cannot conceal from you ; 
for although she is uncommonly reasonable for a wom- 
an, she is also self-willed and imperious to a great de- 
gree. I have said nothing to her of the charge that I 
give you, but she knows our friendship, and will be pre- 
pared to receive you cordially. Whatever happens, do 
not let her fall into any matrimonial snare. I speak of 
this danger because it is the one she would most scorn- 
fully repudiate, and therefore the one most likely to 
j occur. The Vicomtesse de Verac sold herself for a 
title, and would probably not object to assisting or pro- 
moting another transaction of the same order. By the 
bye, if you know anything of her, pray report what 
manner of woman she is.” 

More the letter contained, but at the above point 
Craven’s gravity gave way. The smile with which he 
began to read had been gradually deepening, until now 


70 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


he laughed outright. The absurdity of the situation 
appealed to his sense of humor with irresistible force. 
The doubts and forebodings of the Vicomtesse, which 
were still ringing in his ears, and the grave anxiety ap- 
parent in every line of Bernard’s letter, struck him as 
the elements of a comedy revealed for his special amuse- 
ment. 

“ Now, what will Mademoiselle the Heroine be ?” he 
thought, replacing the letter in its envelope. “ Jack 
writes of her as if she were a royal princess. I like the 
fellow’s impudence in talking of danger for me in the 
attractions of a spoiled American belle ! But what 
would Madame la Vicomtesse think if she could know 
that she is seriously distrusted as not worthy of the 
chaperonage she has undertaken ? Ah! what would any 
of us think if we but knew the whole with regard to any- 
thing in this overwhelmingly droll world ?” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


71 


CHAPTER VII. 

“some charges prove rather difficult.” 

^ 7ELL,” said Craven, smiling, “ what is she like ?” 

V V The Vicomtesse lifted her hands and looked at 
him with a comical expression of surprise. It was her 
evening of reception, and, by appearing early, he found 
her alone. She was more of a picture than ever in her 
exquisite toilet, and the beautiful room made a harmo- 
nious background, with its soft tints and tranquil, 
flower-perfumed atmosphere. 

“ She is like — what shall I say ?” she replied. “ Fancy 
the Venus de Milo with arms and a modern dress — 
that is what she is like more than anything else I can 
conceive.” 

“ She must be very beautiful.” 

“ Sne is strikingly beautiful. But you will see her 
and judge for yourself.” 

“And your fears are all dissipated, your doubts all 
relieved ?” 

“ Completely. She is not only handsome, but she 
has the air of one who has always commanded social 
homage. That is something which cannot be affected, 
or learned in a day.” 

“ It is not remarkable in her case. There is probably 
no creature in the world so accustomed to homage as an 
American beauty and belle.” 


72 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ I suppose not. It has been so long since I was an 
American beauty and belle that I have nearly forgotten 
what was incident to the position.” 

Craven paid the compliment which was expected of 
him here, and then asked if he might hope to have the 
pleasure of seeing Miss Lorimer. 

” Oh, yes,” the Vicomtesse answered. ” She has 
promised to appear — ah, voild, !" 

She looked toward the door communicating with an- 
other apartment as she spoke, and Craven tu,rned in 
that direction. Between the rich folds of the curtains 
stood a figure that made an instantaneous impression of 
dignity and grace on his mind. Madame de Verac’s 
comparison of the Venus de Milo had caused him to 
smile when she uttered it, but now he recognized that 
there was something suggestive of the noble lines of 
antique beauty in the face and form before him. It was 
only for an instant that Cecil paused, like a picture in a 
frame : the next moment she advanced, and he saw a 
tall, beautiful girl, whose pale, clear-cut face seemed to 
him the frankest and noblest countenance he had ever 
looked on. 

‘‘You come in good time, my dear,” observed the 
Vicomtesse. ‘‘ Here is Mr. Craven, who is anxious to 
meet you.” 

” If you have not heard Jack Bernard speak of me 
often. Miss Lorimer, I shall think he is a faithless 
friend,” said Craven, as he stepped forward. 

Cecil looked at him for an instant with her clear eyes 
before she answered — a short space of time, yet long 
enough to make Craven feel as if he had been weighed and 
measured. Then she smiled as she extended her hand. 

” I have often heard Jack speak of you, Mr. Craven,” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


73 


she replied ; “ and I warn you that if you are able to 
justify all that he has said, you must be a very remark- 
able person indeed.” 

” Has he been even more complimentary than 1 dared 
to expect?” asked Craven. “Diffidence is not my 
fault. I feel within myself a capability for justifying 
any moderately good opinion.” 

‘Jack is a very enthusiastic friend,” answered Miss 
Lorimer ; “ but I have no doubt of your capability to 
justify his opinion.” 

Craven bowed. “ I hope that I shall be fortunate 
enough to justify yours,” he said ; and as they sat 
down, while Madame de Verac turned to greet other 
guests, he added : “I have just congratulated the 
.Vicomtesse on your arrival, and I must now congratu- 
late you. Every one has heard of the accident to your 
'ship. It was a wonderful escape for all concerned.” 

“I think we all feel it so,” she answered. “The 
ship was greatly shattered by the collision, and but for 
her water-tight compartments would have been lost.” 

“ It must have been a terrible shock when you came 
in contact with the ice.” 

“ It was terrible.” She paused for a moment as if to 
recall it, while the beautiful drawing-room seemed to 
fade away, and she saw before her again the long saloon 
of the ship, the pale, excited faces, the vision of death 
which had appeared so near, and Tyrconnel’s dark, 
grave eyes. 

“ A shock to the strongest nerves, I should think,” 
Craven went on. “ Did it not make you apprehensive 
for the rest of the voyage ?” 

She shook her head. “ I was not apprehensive at all, 
although we saw much more ice. Nothing is more true 


74 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


than that a coward dies a hundred deaths. Now, I can- 
not see the good of dying more than once.” 

” You are very sensible as well as very brave,” said 
Craven, smiling ; ” but most people — most women 
especially — cannot control their fears.” 

” I think 1 am brave by nature,” she said, carelessly, 
” and therefore I deserve little credit for it. Jack 
always prophesies that I shall some day run into great 
danger, because, as he puts it, I have ‘ every sense but 
the sense of fear.’ ” 

” I hardly know whether to call that a commendation 
or the reverse. ” 

” There is no doubt Jack meant it for the reverse. 
By the bye, he seemed quite certain that I should see 
you soon ; for his last words to me were, ‘ Tell Craven 
to remember my charge.’ ” 

” He knows my weakness for this gay capital, and he 
wrote to me not long ago, giving me a charge which I 
shall take great pleasure in fulfilling.” 

She glanced at him with a look half inquisitive, half 
amused. 

” Some charges prove rather difficult,” she said. 

“But some difficulties are animating,” replied 
Craven. 

” That is my favorite maxim,” she said, with a laugh. 
” Well, I have discovered that you are self-satisfied and 
courageous. What phase of character do you mean to 
show me next ?’ ’ 

” If you permit me to say so, that of appreciation.” 

” Of mel Ah ! that is absurd. Do you fancy I do 
not know the portrait Jack has drawn of me, the dark 
colors in which he has painted my character, branding 
it as ‘ incorrigible and wilful ’ ?” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


75 


“Jack betrayed himself, then? Yet the scamp told 
me — “ 

He paused abruptly, for the amusement with which 
Miss Lorimer laughed again told him that he had rather 
betrayed Jack. 

j “ I knew it !’’ she exclaimed. “ I felt sure he had 
written in that manner. But why ? How could he 
fancy that my character would interest you ?’’ 

“ You have surprised me into betraying part of Jack’s 
j confidence. Miss Lorimer ; do you not think I should 
respect the remainder ? I am at liberty to say only 
that he thought I might guard you against a few pit- 
falls, and he conferred on me the rank of your guard- 
ian.” 

“ I believe it is an accepted law, Mr. Craven, that one 
must have authority one’s self in order to confer it on 
another. I do not therefore clearly see how Jack could 
confer on you powers which he does not himself pos- 
sess.” 

“ It is not a question of powers, but only of privilege. 
My rights, if you allow me any, extend only to coun- 
sel.” 

“ I am not aware that I am in need of counsel.” 

“ But you know the proverb that ‘ two heads are bet- 
ter than one, even though one be a blockhead.’ Now, I 
am not quite a blockhead, and I should be more gratified 
than I can say if you would promise to call upon me for 
counsel should any need for it arise. You are in a for- 
eign country, and it is not impossible that such a need 
might arise. It was to provide for it that Jack called 
upon my old and sincere friendship.” 

He had dropped his tone of light banter, and spoke 
so earnestly that Cecil was pleased. 


76 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


‘Jesting apart, I am sure that you are very kind,” 
she said. ” But you forget that I have my cousin to 
call upon in such an emergency.” 

” The Vicomtesse,” said Craven, ” is everything that 
is most charming ; but she \s plus royaliste que le roi. In 
other words, she has lived abroad so long that she is 
steeped in foreign ideas, and might look at things very 
differently from yourself.” 

Cecil smiled. ” We are discussing a very improbable 
event,” she said. ” If Jack told you anything of me, 
he might have told you that I am generally my own 
counsellor.” 

” It was not necessary for Jack to tell me that,” said 
Craven; ” your face assures me of it. Alas!” he added 
quickly, in a different tone, ” the Vicomtesse does not 
mean me to monopolize you longer. Here she comes 
with De Verac. Have you met him ?” 

Cecil had only time to answer in the negative when 
the Vicomtesse approached them on the arm of a young 
man, whom she presented to Cecil as ” My nephew, the 
Comte de Verac.” 

Cecil’s intuition was too quick for her to give a merely 
surface-reading to the pride which filled the words ” My 
nephew ;” and as she glanced at the bearer of the title, 
she thought kindly that pride was permissible in claim- 
ing connection with one in whom grace and distinction 
were so happily blended. Instead of the small, dark 
Frenchman with whom one is familiar, she saw a tall, 
blonde gentleman, with manners of quiet repose, who 
looked at her with evident admiration, but not the least 
trace of gallantry. 

” I hope. Mademoiselle, that you have quite recovered 
from the fatigue and perils of your long journey,” he 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


77 


said in English, without a trace of foreign accent ; 
“ and, since first impressions are strong, that France 
has pleased you.” 

” Does France ever fail to please ?” asked Cecil, with 
her brilliant smile. ” At least” — with a glance around 
her — ” it certainly could not fail to please me.” 

“At this season Paris is very charming,” said the 
young man ; ” and if you do not enjoy it, you will be 
unlike the majority of your fair compatriots. They are 
generally devoted to Paris, and Paris returns the com- 
pliment by finding them charming.” 

” Paris certainly exerts a fascination which has be- 
come proverbial in America,” answered Cecil. ” My 
friends were afraid for me to be exposed to it ; they 
feared I might never return to them.” 

“A number of your countrywomen have been per- 
suaded to remain with us,” said M. de Verac, smil- 
ing. 

Miss Lorimer colored quickly. She had forgotten 
for a moment in what particular manner her sister had 
feared she might not return, and she was vexed with 
herself for-alluding to such a possibility. 

” Their fears were very unfounded,” she said, with a 
little hauteur. ” There is not the least danger of my 
remaining. I only meant to illustrate how proverbial 
the fascination of Paris has become in America.” 

” I hope that you will see something of France out- 
side of Paris,” said the young Count. ” There is much 
in the provinces that I think would interest you. For- 
eigners are too apt to believe that Paris is France. 
There could be no greater mistake.” 

” I am very sure that provincial France will interest 
me most of the two,” said Cecil. ” For there, surely. 


78 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE 


some remnants still exist of old royal France. That is 
what I care for, and wish most to see.” 

” Then I must persuade my aunt to bring you down 
to my old chateau. It is an interesting relic of the past ; 
for, by a series of fortunate circumstances, it escaped 
destruction in the Revolution, and remains almost un- 
touched as it was previous to 1789.” 

” Oh, I should like that very much !” said Cecil 
quickly. 

” In that case it must certainly be done,” said De 
Verac. ” I think I can answer for my aunt, who likes 
the chdteau — for a time — at the right season. You must 
prepare yourself for a great deal of antiquity. Since 
the Revolution the family finances have not admitted 
of much restoration.” 

” Which is often another name for demolition. I am 
glad they have not admitted of that.” 

The young man shrugged his shoulders, laughing 
slightly. ” I cannot say that I am exactly glad of it,” 
he observed. ” But the result is at least interesting.” 

” I am sure that it will interest me,” said Cecil 
frankly. 

And indeed, as their conversation proceeded, she 
found M. de Verac himself interesting. A man of the 
world, with the grace of its highest society, he had also 
a well-cultivated mind and a charm of manner quite 
irresistible. It was impossible not to like him ; and 
Cecil had already conceived quite a cordial and friendly 
feeling for him, when the Vicomtesse interrupted their 
conversation by summoning her to be presented to a 
very great lady. The interruption was so gracefully 
made that it did not occur to Miss Lorimer until some 
time later that it had been done with a purpose. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


79 


It was not until after the guests had departed that 
Madame de Verac’s reason for ending the conversation 
I between her nephew and Cecil began to dawn upon the 
I mind of the latter. 

j “You are not tired, my- dear, are you?” said the 
I Vicomtesse caressingly, when they were finally left 
I alone. “ I want to tell you how much I am charmed 
with your success this evening. It is a great pleasure 
to me to introduce to my world one whom the most 
! critical must admire.” 

I “You are too good,” said Cecil, who saw that these 
; words were spoken with perfect sincerity, and were 
indeed the overflowing of the Vicomtesse’s great satis- 
faction. “ I am very glad to do you credit,” she added, 
with a laugh. “ It was something of a risk to invite an 
unknown cousin to Paris. You must have been a trifle 
nervous over the result.” 

“ My dear,” replied Madame de Verac, so relieved 
that entire frankness was possible, “ to tell you the 
truth, I was miserable. I knew you were handsome 
from your photograph, but manner is so much more 
than looks ! How could I tell what you would 
be ?” 

“ I felt sure you were frightened at your own rash- 
ness,'’ said Cecil. “ In your place I could not have 
been so courageous. But now let me say how much I 
am pleased with your friends. They are altogether 
delightful.” 

“ Cela va sans dire. I know only the best people. 
Few have been more successful, I think, than myself in 
forming a most desirable circle. But tell me what you 
think of Armand.” 

“ M. de Verac ? I find him very charming, and do not 


8o A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

wonder that you call him your nephew with an air of 
pride.” 

” He is more like a son than a nephew to me/’ said 
Madame de Verac, in a tone of genuine feeling ; ” and 
I am devoted to him. But, like other men, he can be 
very provoking sometimes.” 

A short pause followed. Cecil neither felt bound to 
ask nor curious to know how M. de Verac was provok- 
ing ; but presently the Vicomtesse continued : 

” Now that you have seen Armand, you can imagine 
that there is nothing so near my heart as his success in 
life. He is very talented, and has lately entered poli- 
tics. Belonging to the Royalist party, he has little to 
hope for at present, but works for the day of reaction, 
which he and others believe certain to come. Mean- 
while his friends desire to see him strengthen himself 
by a suitable alliance — you know that in France, in a 
certain rank of life, all marriages are arranged for the 
mutual advantage of the parties concerned.” 

” Yes,” Cecil replied, she was aware of it. “I 
have read a few French novels,” she added, with a 
smile. 

” It is a very wise custom,” said Madame de Verac. 
” Wei], an opportunity for an alliance of this kind is 
presented to Armand, with only one disadvantage on 
his side. He has rank, social prestige, and talents, but 
he lacks fortune. His father was a notorious viveur, 
who impoverished the family estates ; and Armand him- 
self led a life of gay extravagance for several years. 
Consequently there is this drawback to his presenting 
himself as a suitor to the lady in question, who is a 
daughter of the Due de Mirecourt.” 

” Indeed !” said Cecil, with polite attention. ” But 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


8l 


is fortune always essential ? I fancied that rank, social 
prestige, talent, would atone for the lack of wealth.” 

” It would atone for it in ordinary cases, and more 
than atone for it if he were thinking of marrying be- 
neath his rank. But in Mademoiselle de Mirecourt’s 
suitor exceptional advantages are demanded.” 

” What then ?” asked Cecil, beginning to be amused. 
” Will he resign hope since he has not the necessary 
fortune ?” 

” He is inclined to do so, but I am opposed to such 
an idea. The alliance would be so suitable in every 
way that I have set my heart upon it, and if he would 
listen to me — ” She paused a moment, then said 
quickly : ” I desire to assure him of the absolute in- 
heritance of my fortune. That, united to his own, 
would make him an eligible 

” You are very generous,” said Cecil. Surprise was 
her first feeling, her next was an almost overpowering 
inclination to laugh ; for it occurred to her that Madame 
de Verac was offering her a timely warning against any 
hopes of such inheritance for herself. ” M. de Verac 
must have been very much gratified to find his difficulty 
so smoothed away,” she added after a moment. 

” He will not consent to accept the assurance,” said 
Madame de Verac, in a tone of irritation. ” I have 
urged, I have pleaded, but he is like steel ; I cannot 
make him bend.” 

” Perhaps he is not anxious for the marriage,” haz- 
arded Cecil. ” It seems to me that he might object to 
an arrangement of the kind. A woman must submit, 

I presume ; but a man — ” 

” My dear,” said the Vicomtesse, majestically, ” you 
don’t at all understand. Armand is thoroughly con- 


82 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


servative in all his tastes and opinions — an aristocrat of 
aristocrats. He desires the alliance very much, and it 
would be so suitable in all respects that I hope he will 
yet hear reason with regard to it.” 

“For your sake, I hope so,” said Miss Lorimer. 
” But I approve him for declining your offer. He must 
be an interesting person.” 

This remark was uttered so carelessly, with so much 
of the princess-like air and tone which was characteris- 
tic but quite unconscious on the part of Cecil, that her 
cousin was for an instant uncertain whether to be 
amused or offended. What was to be thought of a girl 
who condescendingly remarked that she ” approved 
of ” the Comte de Verac ? 

Nothing more was said on the subject, but before 
Miss Lorimer retired to her pillow, she wrote a .long 
letter to her sister, and this was one passage in it : 

” Now that I have described Madame de Verac, I 
hope that you and Jack will set your dear, solemn heads 
and hearts at rest about any matrimonial intrigues on 
her part with regard to myself. In the first place, she 
has no suspicion that I am matrimonially desirable ; 
and in the second place, all her attention in that line is 
bestowed at present on her nephew (by marriage). She 
has already given me two items of information which 
have very much amused me, because her intention in 
giving them was so obvious. One is that the inher- 
itance of her fortune is absolutely assured to this young 
Comte de Verac ; the other, that he is ‘ an aristocrat of 
aristocrats,’ who desires an alliance with the daughter 
of the Due de Mirecourt. It seems, however, that a 
slight obstacle in the way of this alliance is the fact 
that he has squandered a large part of his fortune. So 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


83 


the Vicomtesse comes forward and desires to throw 
hers into the scale, to facilitate his ambition and make 
the Duke’s daughter possible. This is very kind of her 
— or would be if one could overlook the fact that the 
generosity really costs her nothing, and is attended by 
much Mat. I feel shabby in writing this ; but, charm- 
ing as Madame de Verac is, I see already the cloven 
foot of adoration for rank peeping out in more than 
one respect. Can any one live as she does and avoid 
the contagion, I wonder ? With her, I fancy, it is held 
in check by good taste ; but I am sure she would con- 
sider the De Mirecourt alliance cheaply purchased at 
the cost of pledging her fortune — after she can no 
longer enjoy it. You may imagine how much I was 
amused by her warning me not to hope for any share of 
this fortune, and not to set my ambitious thoughts upon 
the nephew, whom, I suppose, I must soon see quite 
often. Oh, what comedy there is in life ! I think I 
am really going to enjoy my visit very much.” 


84 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

‘ I FIND HER ADORABLE.” 

ERTAINLY if Miss Lorimer’s prophecy was not 



fulfilled, it was not the fault of the Vicomtesse. 
Delighted to find her young relative so presentable, 
Madame de Verac spared no effort in securing her suc- 
cess in the world in which she had made good her own 
place. It was a pleasure to show the exclusive circle 
which had received her that the stem from which she 
herself had bloomed was capable of producing other 
flowers as fine. ‘‘You have in you all the material of 
a grande dame^ my dear,” she said one day to Cecil. 
‘‘You ought to make a great alliance ; but, unfortu- 
nately, money — a good deal of money — is necessary for 


that.” 


‘‘ Oh, my prophetic soul !” thought Cecil, with a 
smile. Aloud she said : ‘‘ I should not care for an alli- 
ance that had to be made by money ; so do not regret 
that grande dame in me is not likely to come to light. 
After all, I am not sure that it exists.” 

‘‘/am sure,” said the Vicomtesse. ‘‘ But you have 
the romantic ideas of your country — or at least what 
are supposed to be the ideas of your country. I find, 
however, that most Americans are quite ready to lay 
them aside when they come over here — provided they 
have money enough." 

A quick answer — an answer which would have be- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


85 


trayed her — trembled on Cecil’s lips, but she restrained 
it, and only said : “I am afraid I must bear the odium 
of being romantic, for I should not like money to be a 
j factor in my marriage — if I ever marry. But I think 
j that doubtful.*' 

I Madame de Verac shook her head. “ It is doubtful, 

[ if you are too romantic,” she said. 

j But she dropped the subject there ; for, dearly as she 
! would have liked to arrange a grand marriage for this 
beautiful, stately creature, she knew the ways of her 
adopted country too well to think of it for a moment 
as possible. Had she been aware of Cecil’s fortune, 
nothing could have withheld her from match-making 
schemes ; and perceiving this, the young lady felicitated 
heiself on the forethought which had caused her to 
maintain silence on this point. 

” I should be as much tormented with suitors as Miss 
Percival in ‘ L’Abbe Constantin,’ ” she said to herself. 
” The Vicomtesse would give me no peace. Who 
knows ? I might even be considered worthy to become 
Comtesse de Verac.” 

For one so accustomed to admiration as Miss Lorimer 
could not fail to perceive that the young Comte admired 
her extremely. She was, in fact, charming to him, 
with her beauty, her cleverness, her unconsciously prin- 
cess-like air. Like his aunt, he thought that she had 
in her the making of a grande dame. ” What a pity,” 
he thought, with an involuntary sigh, “that she has 
not one of the great American fortunes !” He did not 
add even to himself the unexpressed idea that was, nev- 
ertheless, in his mind, that in such a case he might resign 
with philosophy his pretensions to the hand of Mademoi- 
selle de Mirecourt, and follow the example of his uncle. 


86 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


But now, as ever, thoughts of marriage were little in 
Cecil’s mind. She liked the social atmosphere in which 
she found herself — that charming atmosphere of high- 
bred French society into which foreigners seldom pene- 
trate — its culture, its grace, its exquisite refinement ; 
she expanded in it like a flower, adapting herself 
readily to manners which pleased her, and receiving on 
all sides fresh impressions. 

One thing which struck her forcibly was the tone of 
unaffected piety which seemed to pervade the best of 
this society. Religious questions were discussed with 
as much interest as the last development in politics or 
discovery in science. And when Cecil, who had hitherto 
thought of religion as a thing belonging as little as pos- 
sible to the intellectual world, heard it spoken of in its 
intellectual aspect, affecting the gravest social questions 
and influencing the politics of great nations, she felt as 
if she had wakened in another world. They interested 
her very much, these questions ; she seemed to catch a 
glimpse in them of something greater, higher, nobler 
than she had ever known before ; and she began to 
enlarge her knowledge of them with all the energy 
which characterized her. 

It was not long before she discovered that she could 
not hope for much assistance in this direction from the 
Vicomtesse. Madame de Verac had indeed entered 
the Catholic Church at the time of her second mar- 
riage, but religion was in no sense a vital force in her 
life. She attended Mass decorously, played her part 
in charitable affairs as befitted a great lady, and listened 
to the sermons of great preachers with apparent appre- 
ciation ; but all this was, in a certain sense, a deference 
to the world — that portion of the world with which she 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


87 


desired to identify herself — and had little interest for 
her in itself. Yet as far as she went she was sincere. 
She admired the Catholic Church, and believed all that 
it proposed for belief, without troubling herself to in- 
quire into the grounds of that belief. To Cecil’s ques- 
tions, therefore, she returned but vague and unsatis- 
factory replies ; and observing this. Miss Lorimer soon 
ceased to ask information from her. But her interest 
in the subject did not cease. She went to the functions 
in the great churches with eyes and ears open to learn 
if possible their full meaning ; and the more she saw, 
the more deeply she was interested. Here was some- 
thing which in greatness appealed to her love of great- 
ness, while in majesty and poetry it fulfilled her highest 
ideal. 

So the bright spring days — nowhere so bright as in 
Paris — passed. But none of the new friends surround- 
ing Cecil banished from her memory the recollection of 
the man with whom she had crossed the ocean, and 
whose character had impressed her more deeply than 
she had imagined. Again and again she found herself 
wondering what life lay before him ; what difficult 
task, at which he had hinted, he went to meet with his 
resolute face and eyes. Grace Marriott, who had gone 
to Dresden with her brother, alluded to him frequently 
in her letters. “ Do not fail to tell me if you ever meet 
or hear of Mr. Tyrconnel,” she wrote. “I cannot 
believe that we have seen the last of him ; he interested 
me so much. I think that he even interested hard 
as it is to waken your interest for any member of the 
sterner sex.” 

Cecil smiled a little over this. Yes, she knew that it 
was hard to waken her interest, yet Tyrconnel had done 


88 ' A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

SO without doubt ; and she began to think that there was 
a fair prospect that the young Comte de Verac would 
do so likewise. He pleased her in many ways. His 
culture and polish were delightful, his talents were un- 
deniable, and the charm of his character was very great. 
Frenchmen are usually admirable in their domestic re- 
lations, especially are they the best of sons ; and it was 
almost the relation of son which this young man bore 
to Madame de Verac. His manners to her were always 
charming — a happy blending of affection, admiration, 
and deference, which Cecil decided was thoroughly 
sincere. On her own part she made, as she discovered 
later, one mistake : she showed her liking for him too 
frankly. A young Frenchman is not accustomed to 
this, and is very likely to misunderstand it. M. de 
Verac did not misunderstand it vulgarly — did not fancy, 
as some of his countrymen would have done, that Miss 
Lorimer had lost her heart to him ; but he soon felt 
that it was quite within the limit of possible things that 
he might lose his own heart to the beautiful girl who 
treated him with such frank and gracious kindness. 

He intimated as much one day to Craven, who treated 
the avowal rather cynically. “ What is the good of 
talking in that manner.?” he said. “You know that 
you could not marry an angel if she were not of suit- 
able rank or had not a suitable dot. Miss Lorimer is all 
that you say, but she can be nothing to you.” 

“ Nothing to me when I find her fascinating — adora- 
ble !” said the young Comte, with a smile. “ How 
like your prosaic nation that is, my friend ! Because 
I cannot marry this beautiful creature I am not to find 
her charming ! How practical and how absurd !“ 

“ It is much more absurd to pay her a sentimental 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


89 


homage that means nothing/' said Craven ; “ and that 
might — mind, I don’t say it would — but that might lead 
her to imagine what can never be. For no Frenchman, 
that I am aware of, ever makes a sentimental marriage ; 
and you certainly are not in a position to prove an ex- 
ception to the rule.” 

De Verac shook his head a little sadly. ” No,” he 
said frankly, ” I am not. If I were, I would not an- 
swer for the result.” 

” Well,” said Craven, a little irritably, ” what I beg 
is that, considering this to be the case, you will not 
make your admiration quite so manifest to Miss Lori- 
mer. Remember that she comes from a country where 
men do marry for love.” 

” And where divorce flourishes, I am told,” returned 
the young Comte, a little maliciously. ” Our French 
system has its disadvantages, but, from what I have 
heard, the average of unhappiness is not greater with 
us than in other countries.” 

” Your system is sensible enough and works well 
enough among yourselves,” said Craven ; ” but that 
has nothing to do with the fact that it is difficult for a 
foreigner to understand how entirely you are governed 
in such matters by prudential considerations. There- 
fore I repeat that your admiration is likely to be mis- 
understood by the person to whom it is freely shown.” 

” I should certainly not wish to be misunderstood by 
that person of all others,” said De Verac gravely. 
” Believe me I shall be careful to avoid the possibility 
of such misunderstanding.” 

” And I shall take care,” said Craven to himself, 
” that there is no such possibility.” 

In pursuance of this resolution, the first time that he 


90 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


found an opportunity to speak to Cecil alone he led 
the conversation to the young Comte, and mentioned 
incidentally the matrimonial arrangement into which it 
was likely he would soon enter. Having ventured upon 
the subject with some hesitation, he was very much 
reassured by Miss Lorimer’s smile. 

“ For a conscientious guardian, you are late with 
your warning, Mr. Craven,” she said. ” But, fortu- 
nately for my peace of mind, Madame de Verac antici- 
pated you. Immediately after my first meeting with 
her nephew she told me that negotiations were on foot 
for his marriage to the daughter of the Due de Mire- 
court. This was to let me know that I must not set my 
heart or hopes on him. Then she added that she had 
pledged her fortune to secure the alliance, which was 
to warn me not to build any expectations on that. So ■ 
you see I was fully informed of the situation.” 

” The warnings must have seemed very absurd to 
you,” said Craven, struck by a sense of the folly of his 
own fears; ‘‘but Madame de Verac’s motives were 
good. She thought you might be like — others.” 

‘‘ Oh ! I never blamed her,” answered Cecil, with a ' 
laugh. ‘‘ I did full justice to her motives. But that 
the warnings seemed very absurd to me, I admit. No 
doubt I have always had an exaggerated idea of my 
own importance. It was well to come abroad in order 
to find out that I am, after all, like — others.” 

Craven shook his head. ‘‘ You could never find that 
out,” he said. ‘‘ One has only to know you to discover , 
how very much you are unlike others. But until one 
knows you mistakes are possible.” 

‘‘Mistakes are always possible,” she replied. ‘‘So 
Madame de Verac’s clear statement of the situation 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


91 


relieved even while it amused me. Understanding how 
things are, I can act more freely than if I feared mis- 
apprehension.” 

” Are you quite sure that even now there is no danger 
of that ?” asked Craven significantly. 

She looked at him with surprise. ” What danger 
could there possibly be?” she asked. Then, as he 
hesitated, “Speak frankly,” she said. “What is the 
good of the rdle you have undertaken if you do not 
fulfil it ?” 

“ Frankly, then : you like the Comte de Verac, do 
you not ?” 

“ Very much. He pleases and interests me. What 
then ?” 

“ Only this, that I fear he may misunderstand your 
interest ; and I am sure that you do not wish to inspire 
a hopeless grande passion/' 

“ There is nothing I desire less,” she said, with the 
calmness of one to whom such a thing was by no means 
new ; “ but I do not think that there exists the remotest 
danger of it. M. de Verac is no more likely to conceive 
a grande passion for me than I am to find him danger- 
ously fascinating, or to dream of becoming Madame la 
Comtesse. So pray set your mind at rest.” 

“ It is at rest so far as you are concerned,” continued 
Craven, smiling ; “ but I am by no means sure of De 
Verac. He is of inflammable material, although, like 
all his countrymen, when it comes to marriage he will 
be guided by considerations' of co7ivenance alone.” 

“Then,” said Cecil, with delicate scorn, “there is 
no need to fear for inflammable material which can be 
held in such admirable control. But this is a matter 
which concerns himself alone. In all that concerns me 


92 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


I find him exceedingly agreeable and interesting. He 
is anxious for Madame de Verac to take me on a visit to 
his chateau, and I am sure that I shall like it very much.” 

” I am sure that you will,” said Craven. ” He has 
spoken of the plan to me, and kindly asked me to be of 
the party. Country life in France is charming, and 
will be new to you.” 

‘‘All French life seems to me charming,” she said. 
” I have never been more agreeably surprised than by 
what I have found it to be.” 

“You have been rarely fortunate in the aspect of it 
which you have seen,” Craven observed. ” Very few 
Americans, no matter what may be the degree of their 
wealth or social pretensions, are ever admitted to the 
circle into which Madame de Verac has introduced you. 
Paris is very different from London in this, respect. 
There is no circle in the latter place too exclusive for 
wealth to buy a way into it ; but wealth may knock in 
vain at those doors which you have entered. It was 
not her money which carried Madame de Verac across 
their thresholds, but her marriage and her personal 
qualities.” 

” She would not have been received if she had not 
become a Catholic,, I suppose ?” said Cecil meditatively. 

” Received — oh ! yes, in a degree. But there could 
not have been the same sympathy of feeling ; for no 
doubt you have discovered that the religious question 
underlies the whole fabric of life.” 

” I have only discovered it since I have been here,” 
she said. ” Do not think me very dull not to have dis- 
covered it earlier. It has always seemed to me some- 
thing altogether external, and independent of things 
which I now see that it enters into largely.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


93 


Craven shrugged his shoulders. “ Narrow forms of 
religion,” he said, “ enter narrowly into life, and either 
make it as contracted in sentiment and motive as them- 
selves by controlling it — witness the various forms of 
Puritanism — or become wholly external to it, without 
the power of influence even, far less of control. But 
Catholicity deserves its name, inasmuch as it is truly 
universal in all things. It is not only as wide as the 
world, but it is as wide as human nature. Nothing is 
foreign to it, and it enters into everything ; for even 
those who oppose it pay tribute to its importance by 
the vehemence of their opposition.” 

Cecil regarded him with surprise. ” Are you a Catho- 
lic ?” she asked. 

He shook his head, smiling. “No,” he answered ; 
” I am only a man of the world, who recognizes the 
greatest moral power in it.” 


94 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER IX. 

“ ACCORDING TO THE FASHION OF ROMANCE ?” 

RAVEN’S warning, slight as it was, had an effect 



upon Miss Lorimer which that of the Vicomtesse 
had not exercised. The latter had only amused her, as 
it seemed to hint at danger for herself ; but Craven had 
spoken of possible danger for another — and that other 
one whom she liked sincerely. Though she had laughed 
at such a possibility, she knew in her heart that it was 
a possibility — that, notwithstanding the witty classifica- 
tion of human nature and French nature, there is avast 
amount of human nature in French nature, and that 
the prospect or intention of making a mariage de con- 
venance in the future would not absolutely prevent a man 
from falling in love in the present. 

Now, there was not a single impulse of coquetry in 
Cecil’s nature. She not only had no desire that men 
should fall in love with her, but, on the contrary, she 
had a very strong desire that they should not do so, 
and she generally contrived to nip such an inclination 
in the bud. It only annoyed her and gave her pain 
when persisted in ; and she had no wish either to give 
pain to the young Comte de Verac or to be pained by 
feeling that she was the cause of suffering to him. 
After Craven’s words, consequently, she observed 
Armand closely, and came to the decision that it would 
be a measure of prudence to be less frank and friendly 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


95 


in her manner. As a result of this precaution, M. de 
Verac soon perceived a change in her. It was delicate, 
it was almost imperceptible, but it was sufficient to 
: mark the fact that the privilege of intimacy which he 
had found so delightful was, in a degree at least, with- 
1 drawn. 

i It was natural that he did not like this, and indeed if 
: Cecil had subtly studied a means of animating his in- 
terest, she could not have been more successful in doing 
so. He began to say to himself more frequently, “ If 
ishe had but a great American fortune !” and to reflect, 

I in that case, what an altogether charming comtesse she 
i would make. Meanwhile he did not suffer Madame de 
Verac to forget her promise to go to chateau iotv 2. 
visit. “ We must show Miss Lorimer something of 
French country life,” he would say. ” I think the 
provinces will interest her.” 

Cecil was very sure that the provinces would interest 
her, for she felt as if she were already living in a 
romance. It was not modern Paris, with its glare and 
its glitter, its boulevards and avenues and foreign colo- 
nies, which pleased her, but that stately old Paris across 
the Seine — the Paris of the Faubourg St. Germain, of 
the Quartier Latin, of the He de la Cite. Her heart 
thrilled within her when she stood in the Sainte Chapelle 
— that matchless gem of architectural beauty — and 
thought of the Saint and King who had builded it to 
receive the Sacred Thorns. The lilies of France took 
new meaning when they were thus brought to adorn 
the shrine of the emblems and instruments of supreme 
suffering. In this spot history and poetry meet. The 
Ages of Faith are kneeling at the foot of Calvary ; mail- 
clad Crusaders, who crossed land and sea to fight for 


96 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


the Holy Sepulchre, have venerated the Thorns which 
crowned the sinless head of Christ, and devoutly heard 
the Mass which to-day, as on that long-past yesterday, 
renews the Sacrifice offered for the sins of men. Cecil 
could not indeed feel all this, but she felt enough to 
thrill her heart, as has been already said, and to make 
her exclaim, impulsively : “It is too beautiful not to 
be true.” 

“ Beauty is not always an unfailing sign of truth,” 
observed Craven, who chanced to be by her side at the 
moment. 

She looked at him with a smile. “ I did not mean 
beauty of outward form,” she said, “ but beauty and 
harmony of idea and feeling. It all suits so perfectly. 
This exquisite shrine is the expression of a faith and an 
ardor which were in perfect accord with the belief that 
inspired them. I can understand how it prompted men 
to such deeds as those which we recall here. What I 
cannot understand is how it has lost its force with the 
lapse of time.” 

“ What influence is there which does not lose its force 
with the lapse of time ?” said Craven. “It is the his- 
tory of humanity.” 

“ Human influences — yes,” she answered. “ But 
this was divine ; so it must be the fault of men if it no 
longer animates them to the faith of St. Louis, and the 
deeds which proved that faith.” 

“What do you think of this, De Verac ?” asked 
Craven, turning to that young man. “ Miss Lorimer 
wants to know why your faith does not animate you to 
the deeds of St. Louis.” 

“ Miss Lorimer must remember,” said the Comte, 
smiling, “that St. Louis is rather a difficult standard 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


97 


by which to try men of any age, but especially men of 
the nineteenth century.” 

” I meant St. Louis merely as a type,’’ answered Miss 
, Lorimer. ” I was wondering why the influence which 
was so strong at one time of the world’s history has 
I lost so much of its force now.” 

With the light of the stained glass pouring over her 
— that glorious, famous glass of the Sainte Chapelle, 
which modern art in vain endeavors to imitate — she 
i stood looking up at the empty shrine like one who 
I questions an oracle. 

” The answer to that question would take us very 
j far, ’ ’ said M. de Verac. ‘ ‘ You must be aware of some of 
; the causes which have changed the piety of the Middle 
Ages into the indifference of modern times. But the in- 
i fluence which inspired that piety has not lost its force. 
Instead of the Crusaders we have to-day missionaries.” 

She made a little gesture of impatience. “As if you 
did not have them always ! Always there were men 
who separated themselves from the world to serve God ; 
but where are the men of the world who do great things 
for their faith now as then ?” 

” They exist, believe me, even here in France — 
although they do not now go to fight for the Holy 
Sepulchre.” 

She glanced significantly around at the empty chapel. 
” It seems to me that there are other sepulchres for 
which they might fight,” she said. 

“You are a little exaltee in your ideas, I fear, my 
dear Cecil,” said Madame de Verac’s soft tones. “ We 
must take the world as we find it, and not look for the 
Ages of Faith in the nineteenth century. Shall we go 
now ? It is a little chill, I think,” 


98 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


They left the beautiful chapel of St. Louis, and went 
out into the sunshine ; but Cecil, who seemed still deep 
in meditation, rather startled her companions by pres- 
ently saying, abruptly, 

“ Some day, if I ever build a church, I will duplicate, 
as far as modern art can do so, the Sainte Chapelle.” 

“ Do you think that you are likely to build a church 
— yourself?” asked Madame de Verac, lifting her eye- 
brows a little. 

” Why not ?” said Cecil, still absently. ” Could one 
do better, if one had the necessary faith ?” 

“ Not possibly — if one had also the necessary money,” 
said Craven, laughing. 

” Oh, money !” — she seemed to rouse, and laughed 
herself. “Yes, that would certainly be necessary,” 
she assented ; ” but, after all, not so much so as faith.” 

She spoke carelessly, and her words had no signifi- 
cance for any one save Craven ; but he suddenly re- 
membered how, not many days before, an American 
acquaintance had said to him, ” I saw you at the opera 
with two beautiful women last night. One was Miss 
Lorimer the heiress, was it not ?” 

” Miss Lorimer — yes,” Craven had answered ; ” but 
she is not an heiress, that I am aware of.” 

” She is considered so by those who know best,” was j 
the careless reply. ‘‘ I believe no one knows exactly 
the amount of her father’s fortune — he was a man who 
had all kinds of speculative investments everywhere — 
but he is thought to have left a large estate. I have 
heard it estimated at several millions.” 

“Such things are often exaggerated,” said Craven. 
But to himself he thought that this might (if true) 
account for Jack Bernard’s letter, his evident fears for 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


99 


his beautiful sister-in-law, and that idea of her impor- 
tance which had so much amused the man of the world. 
He had laughed over the letter when he first received 
it — laughed with good-humored contempt at the pro- 
vincial imagination which conceived that a pretty Ameri- 
can girl because she had been admired at home could 
be in danger of snares, matrimonial or any kind what- 
soever, in Paris. But if she were an heiress — perhaps 
a great heiress— that would put another face on the 
matter. It began to seem to him that this was very 
probable. And if it were so ? He smiled to himself, 
thinking of M. de Verac. “ If he had a suspicion of it, 
nothing could hold him in check,” Craven reflected. 
” Is she going to test the disinterestedness of his pas- 
sion, according to the fashion of romance ? If so, I 
fear that she will be sadly disappointed. No French- 
man marries for love.” 

The question, however, had been left in so much 
doubt — his friend had spoken so carelessly and with so 
little exact knowledge — that he thought no more of it 
until Cecil’s remark brought it again to his mind. Her 
princess-like way of announcing that if she had the 
necessary faith she would reproduce the Sainte Chapelle, 
and her reply to his suggestion about money, recalled 
what he had heard, and inclined him to believe that it 
might be true. 

Up to this time he had left it in doubt whether he 
would accept De Verac’s invitation to join the party 
about to assemble at his chdteau^ but after this he let it 
be understood that his going was quite certain. In 
fact, his imagination was pleased with the idea of the 
mystery which he thought he had discovered, of the 
story that was probably going on, of the romantic 


lOO 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


denouement which might be its end. “ When she has 
sufficiently tested his devotion, she will let him know 
that there is no obstacle to his happiness,” Craven 
thought. ” That will be the end — if the millions exist.’ 

Miss Lorimer gave as little thought as possible to her 
millions — that is, with regard to any probable suitors ; 
but with regard to what was nearer her heart — the doing 
some great work for the good of others — she began to 
think much. It chanced that among the ladies of high 
rank whom the Vicomtesse most delighted to know, 
were two or three who were devout according to the 
type with which all the world has been made familiar 
in the beautiful characters of ” A Sister’s Story.” With 
these ladies Cecil was particularly charmed. Austere 
devotion would have repelled her, but their gayety and 
grace lent an attraction to their piety ; and when she 
found how unaffected and how deep the latter was, and 
especially when she was introduced to some of the great 
charities in which they were interested, her heart was 
filled with the desire to make a worthy use of the for- 
tune which God had entrusted to her. She had thought 
of it often — her mind had never been engrossed with 
small things ; she had realized the responsibility of 
wealth almost as soon as she had realized what wealth 
was to be hers ; but her wishes and intentions had been 
as vague as possible. To do some great work, to help 
some great cause — this was what she had contemplated. 
But she knew not where to turn to look for the work or 
the cause. 

Nor could it be said that she had found either yet. 
But she saw works of charity such as had never entered 
into her experience or knowledge before, and she felt 
that into such channels she would like to pour the 


A WOMAN pF FORTUNE. 


lOl 


superfluity of her wealth. She was aflame with the 
desire to make a great and wide-reaching use of what 
had been given to her so lavishly, but the exact oppor- 
tunity for which she was looking had not yet presented 
itself. 

Meanwhile the brilliant days, made enjoyable by 
varied pleasures and occupations, passed swiftly ; and 
when the first burst of summer warmth came, the 
Vicomtesse declared that it was time to leave Paris. 

“ I generally go to my own country-house,” she said. 
” It is not far from Paris, and is altogether modern and 
comfortable. For comfort one likes modern things as 
much as for picturesqueness one likes ancient ones. 
But Armand is so anxious that we should go to his 
chateau^ that I must defer showing you my pretty villa 
on the Seine until later in the season. Villemur is a 
delightful place, and will enchant you.” 

” I am sure of that,” said Cecil. ” Everything 
M. de Verac has told me of it sounds enchanting.” 

” You will find that he has not told half of its charms. 
It has been a grand place, and will be so again, I hope. 
Only money is needed to restore it to all its former 
splendor.” 

” Only money !” repeated Cecil, thoughtfully. ” It 
is constantly a fresh surprise to me to realize what a 
factor money is in human life.” 


102 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE 


CHAPTER X. 

“every door is barred with gold.” 
ILLEMUR, the chateau of the Comte de Verac, was 



V indeed a fine old place — half feudal castle, half 
palace of the Renaissance, set in the midst of an exten- 
sive park, and, from its wide terraces, dominating the 
country for miles around. Its lords had once been 
seigneurs of a vast territory ; but with the lapse of time 
their power had been curtailed, their fortune dimin- 
ished, their lands lost, until now the domain appertain- 
ing to the chdteau was comparatively small, and much 
encumbered from the extravagance of the last possessor. 
As much as possible, the place had been put in order 
for the reception of the guests whom the young Comte 
was bringing ; but a little hurried work could not efface 
the neglect of years. Grounds and gardens were over- 
grown, fountains and statues were broken ; while the 
castle itself, with its splendid rooms, its courts, quad- 
rangles, halls and galleries, was hardly more than a 
noble shell waiting for the touch of wealth to transform 
it into magnificence. 

Yet it interested Cecil far more than if the change 
which the Vicomtesse so much desired had taken place. 
A few rooms were fitted up with the luxuries of modern 
comfort, but the remainder were filled with antique fur- 
niture, the styles of which ran back through centuries. 
The chdteau was one of the few which had escaped pil- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


103 


lage in the Revolution, and was therefore most inter- 
esting to the antiquarian as well as to the artist. 

“ Do you not see what a place it could be made ?” 
said the Vicomtesse, as they wandered through great 
suites of apartments. “ Restored, it would be one of 
the most magnificent places in France. But it would 
take an immense fortune to restore it. Mine is not 
large enough. When I am done with it, it will give 
Armand a good income ; but it can never restore Vil- 
lemur.” 

“ Perhaps Mademoiselle de Mirecourt — ” began 
Cecil. 

But Madame de Verac shook her head. “ Mademoi- 
selle de Mirecourt’s fortune is modest,” she said. ” It 
is rank and alliance that are to be gained there. But 
sometimes I think” — she paused a moment, looked 
around the magnificent salon in which they stood, 
walked to the window, glanced wistfully over the wide 
stretch of the park, and then concluded, thoughtfully — 
” sometimes I think that it might be better for Armand 
to marry 'an heiress. Others have thought so always, 
but I — I only think so when I look at Villemur. To 
restore this place, to make it all that it ought to be, 
and in making it that to make it also a stronghold for 
the Church and the King — that would be worth a sacri- 
fice. When a man seeks wealth he must descend in 
rank ; but, after all, there are some heiresses who would 
make worthy chatelaines even of Villemur.” 

Probably she was thinking of herself as she glanced 
toward a tall mirror, which gave back her graceful re- 
flection. But Cecil could scarcely restrain a smile as 
she caught a glimpse in the same mirror of her own 
beauty, and knew how well she was able not only to 


104 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


restore Villemur but to bear herself worthily as its 
chatelaine. For the first time it flashed through her 
mind that here might be the use which she was seeking 
for her wealth — not the mere vulgar use of repairing a 
ruined fortune, but the better one of restoring a great 
name and a great house ; of making Villemur itself all 
that Madame de Verac dreamed ; and, more than that, 
to plant in it afresh the house of De Verac, and trans- 
form its head from an insignificant adherent of a great 
cause to one of its leaders. All this passed before her 
like a vivid dream. She seemed to catch a view of pos- 
sibilities as noble and far-reaching as the vista of stately 
rooms stretching before her. She had but to put forth 
her hand to make these possibilities realities. It was a 
dazzling thought. 

The light of it was still in her eyes when presently 
the young Comte came to beg them to go out into the 
gardens. “ I have some beautiful views to show you,” 
he said. ” Little else, I fear.” 

The views were beautiful indeed, but so were the 
gardens to Cecil, overgrown and neglected though they 
were. What noble possibilities were here as in the 
chateau ! The terraces with their flights of marble steps, 
the long, green alleys, the picturesque pond filled with 
venerable carp, the great wooded stretches of the park 
— all enchanted her, all were full not only of actual 
beauty, but of romantic suggestions, of the poetry and 
splendor of the old life which passed away forever 
under the bloody wheel of the Revolution. She felt as 
if she were in a dream of past and future mingled. The 
stately figures of the ancien r^ghne seemed to fill the 
wide spaces ; and mingling with them, as it were, was 
her- own, adopting this life as her own, making this 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


105 

place her home, beautifying, restoring, pouring a stream 
of wealth into it which would make its capabilities 
realities. 

“You have more than a beautiful place,” she said to 
the Comte, when they were walking a little apart. “ It 
is a poem, and speaks of a great position and a great 
influence. The seigneur of Villemur is, I perceive, a 
much greater person than I had imagined.” 

He smiled in answer to her smile as she uttered the 
last words, but said, a little sadly : “ You mean that 
the seigneur of Villemur should be a great person. 
That is true. But, unfortunately, what he should be is 
very different from what he is. The greatness of Vil- 
lemur is a tradition of the past, and the influence of its 
lord is too limited in scope to be recognized in these 
days.” 

She made a slight motion of her hand over the wide 
and beautiful scene which lay before them — the smiling, 
fertile, verdant country, with the red roofs of its farm- 
houses scattered here and there, and the village of Vil- 
lemur lying at its feet. 

“Your influence must surely be recognized here,” 
she said. 

“ Oh ! here — yes, of course, after a manner it still 
exists here,” he replied. “ But I have never cared for 
this, and from the long absence of both my father and 
myself it has greatly diminished.” 

“ But it could be restored,” she said, thoughtfully. 
“ From the position which God has given you, you are 
naturally the leader of these people— their leader in 
thought as well as in action. It seems to me that you 
might do much good, great good, here. Have I not 
heard you deplore the alienation of feeling between 


io6 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


classes in France, and the apathy of the people, espe- 
cially in rural districts, toward the most vital political 
questions ? Do you not believe that this could be in a 
great measure changed if men like yourself strove to 
win their confidence and regard, to instruct and direct 
them — in one word, to use nobly for noble ends the 
position and influence which are yours ?” 

She looked at him with a glance which seemed to see 
the noble ends'of which she spoke — a glance so radiant 
with the glow of high thoughts that it might have fired 
a more sluggish nature than that of the Comte de 
Verac. He responded with quick enthusiasm : 

“ Yes, all that is possible. You are right in thinking 
it. Much, very much, could be done here. But many 
things are needed in order to do it — things which 1 do 
not possess.” 

‘‘You possess the essential things,” she said, ‘‘ and 
the others might be added.” 

He shrugged his shoulders lightly. ‘‘ They might be- 
— yes,” he answered ; ‘‘ but it is not likely that they 
will be.’ ’ 

Cecil did not reply, and they walked on in silence for 
some moments. She felt like one who held in her hand 
the key to great possibilities, and she was tempted as 
she had never been tempted before — not by the splen- 
did position which she might command, but by the 
opportunities for action and for good which seemed 
opening before her. She turned suddenly a quick, 
penetrating gaze on the young man. 

‘‘Tell me,” she said, ‘‘what is the first, the most 
important thing which you need to enable you to do 
these things ?” 

He smiled. ‘‘ Do not be disgusted,” he replied, ” if 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


107 


I say that the first, the most important thing is money 
— a great deal of money. One cannot be a very impor- 
tant personage without it.” 

” Surely here, in the home of your race, your im- 
portance should not depend upon money.” 

“A poor man cannot live at Villemur,” he said. 
” Or if he did, he would have little influence. You 
know the world well enough, I presume, to know that. 
And I am, comparatively speaking, a poor man. If I 
were not” — he looked at her with a glow in his eyes 
which was unmistakable — ” there are things at which I 
would aim more important to me than those of which 
we have spoken.” 

” It does not appear to me that anything could be 
more important than those,” she answered. ” If you 
do not feel that, you would never be likely to accom- 
plish them.” 

” A man might accomplish anything who had you for 
an inspirer,”- he said quickly. ” You seem made for 
great things — not for small ones at all.” 

” I confess that I like great things better than small 
ones,” she answered ; ” but life is so ordered that one 
has much more to do with small than great ones. And 
I suppose that true wisdom and sometimes true heroism 
consist in regarding the small ones as if they were great 
ones.” 

She spoke more to herself than to him, and it marked 
a great difference in Cecil, from what had formerly been 
her opinion, that such an idea had occurred to her, and 
that she recognized its force. The whole bent of her 
nature was so strongly toward great things, that it was 
difficult for her to realize the greatness that often lies 
in small things, when those small things are lifted to 


Io8 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

nobleness by the purpose that underlies or the sacrifice 
that hallows them. 

At this point, somewhat to her relief, they were joined 
by the rest of the party, and presently, when they 
assembled on the great terrace in front of the chdteau^ 
she was glad that Craven came up to her. Even if he 
had not been Bernard’s friend she would have liked 
him, and all the better that his liking for herself was 
evidently of so calm an order ; but, being a link with 
the home and the friends she had left, he was specially 
agreeable to her. Just now, as she looked at his keen, 
thoughtful face, a recollection of their first, partly jest- 
ing words together occurred to her. “ If you need a 
counsellor,” he had said, ” remember that you may 
command me.” And a wild impulse seized her to take 
him at his word — to ask his advice, or at least to draw 
upon his knowledge of the people and things around 
her. She did not positively say to herself that under 
certain circumstances she would marry the Comte de 
V^rac, but she was conscious of a leaning, an attrac- 
tion, which might result in such a decision. It did not 
at the moment occur to her that it was not so much 
the man himself who attracted her as the circumstances 
of his life and position. She had long ago made a cove- 
nant with herself that she would devote her fortune to 
some great end, to furthering some worthy cause ; was 
it the romantic charm of Villemur which tempted her 
to think that the end and the cause might be found 
here ? She was asking herself this question when 
Craven spoke. 

‘‘lam sure you agree with me. Miss Lorimer, that 
our friend De Verac is a lucky man to possess this noble 
old place. To have it might reconcile one to the danger 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


109 

of being beheaded some day simply for the crime of its 
proprietorship.’' 

Cecil smiled. “ I hope M. de Verac’s head is in no 
danger,” she answered ; “but certainly it is a noble 
place, and ought to represent a great deal of power and 
influence.” 

“Perhaps so,” said Craven doubtfully; “but in 
France at present a man is handicapped by a great 
name and an aristocratic position— that is, politically. 
An adventurer like Gambetta, or an obscure soldier 
like Boulanger, is the man who becomes leader of senti- 
ment and opinion.” 

“ But might not that be changed if, among the men 
of old name .and hereditary rank, some one would arise 
with the capabilities of a leader ?” 

“ If he were a man of genius of course he could do 
much ; but, as 1 have already remarked, his rank would 
handicap him — unless he followed the rdle of Rochefort. 
And I suppose you are hardly thinking of that.” 

“ Hardly. And yet I am sure — I feel positive — that 
such rank and position as are here might be used for 
great good — might give their possessor a great power 
to lead and influence men to the best ends, rather than, 
like Rochefort, to the worst.” 

“It might be,” he assented ; “but the man who 
could do this must have powers which I fear the Comte 
de Verac, charming as he is, does not own. And, be- 
sides these powers, he must have an impersonal end in 
view. He must either be a philanthropist or an ardent 
partisan. M. de Verac is neither.” 

“ He is ambitious to serve the party to which he 
belongs.” 

“ Yes, within due bounds. But the enthusiasm which 


no A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

leads men to self-sacrifice is not in him, and without 
that no man will ever serve a cause greatly.” Then, 
catching a sudden, startled look, as it were, in Cecil’s 
eyes, he added : ” Do not think that I mean to depre- 
ciate him. He has a good deal of generous ardor, I am 
sure ; but he naturally thinks first of himself and his 
own ambitions. There are few men who do not.” 

” Few — yes. Bfit there must be some, else great 
things would not be done.” 

He shrugged his shoulders lightly. ” Are many 
great things done ? I think not. But do not let me 
spoil your faith in any one, least of all in our pleasant 
young host. If I were so unfortunate as to do that, he 
would never forgive me ; for there is no one whose 
good opinion he values more than yours.” 

She smiled a little sceptically. “Are you sure of 
that ?” she asked. “ I am not, by any means.” 

And then she turned away. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Ill 


CHAPTER XI. 

“ IF SHE WERE AN HEIRESS !’ 

T he Vicomtesse was the next person who took 
Craven into her confidence. A day or two had 
elapsed since the arrival of the party at Villemur, and 
the devotion of the young host to his fair American 
guest could no longer escape, notice. His passion had 
indeed passed beyond his own control, and, fanned by 
the close association with its object, was rapidly ap- 
proaching the point when declaration became unneces- 
sary. The Vicomtesse, who up to this time had viewed 
his fancy complacently enough, began now to take 
alarm, and the first result of this was her summoning 
Craven to a private interview. 

“You have a great deal of tact," she began, “and 
I want your advice in a matter which is beginning to 
disquiet me.” 

He smiled. “ A little judicious flattery sometimes 
does wonders in developing tact as well as other quali- 
ties,” he remarked. “ Mine is at your service. What 
is it that disquiets you ?” 

“ I am sorry to say that it is the fear that Armand is 
acting very foolishly with regard to Cecil. Have you 
observed his manner toward her ?” 

Craven laughed a little. “ I should be totally de- 
ficient in observation if I had not perceived that he is 
very much in love with Miss Lorimer,” he replied. 


II2 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ But you know your world — you know that he is not 
likely to allow a sentiment of the kind to interfere with 
the serious objects of hip life.” 

“ If I were sure of that 1 should not be disquieted at 
all,” said the Vicomtesse frankly ; “and for a time I 
was sure. But since we have been here I have changed 
my mind, and I think — I fear — that he is ready for any 
folly. What steps to take I do not know. Remon- 
strance from me would be useless if his infatuation is 
serious. I have thought that perhaps you might sound 
his intentions. He speaks to you very freely, does he 
not?” 

“ He has done so. I could sound his intentions very 
easily, I think. But how if they should prove to be 
what you fear ?” 

“ In that case I should leave no means untried to 
change them. I could never forgive myself if I were 
the cause of his ruining his life by such a misalliance^ 

“ Do you really think it would be a inisallia^iceV' he - 
asked, regarding her curiously. “ It seems to me that 
Miss Lorimer would be a fit bride for a prince.” 

The Vicomtesse shrugged her shoulders impatiently. 

“ Miss Lorimer in the abstract is very well,” she an- 
swered. “With training she could fill any position. 
But Armand needs to look for much beside beauty and 
good manners. You know that.” 

“ If she were an heiress would you object ?” 

“ What is the good of such a supposition ? She is not 
an heiress.” 

“ I suppose not,” said Craven, slowly ; “ but if she 
were— say that she had one of the great American for- 
tunes — do you not think she would made a good Com- 
tesse de Verac then ?” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. II3 

“ Even then I should prefer to see Armand marry in 
his own rank. But a great fortune could do so much 
for him and for Villemur that I should be reconciled if 
it were united with a person as irreproachable as Cecil. 
But why dwell on such an idea ? I repeat that she is 
no heiress.” 

” Well, I will sound De Verac, and let you know the 
result,” said Craven. ” Meanwhile do not let the mat- 
ter annoy you. I have a firm belief that nothing which 
you fear will come to pass.” 

With these words he went away, smiling to himself ; 
for he had a very well-defined idea of what would come 
to pass. After Cecil had tested the disinterestedness of 
De Verac’s affection, she would reward him with her 
fortune and herself in approved romantic style, he had 
no doubt. He was a shrewd observer, and her manner 
of late had made him sure of this. 

Some little time elapsed before he had an opportunity 
to approach De Verac on the subject. But when he 
did so, he found the young man not at all inclined to 
evade him ; indeed it seemed a great relief to him to 
speak frankly. 

” Yes,” he said, ” I confess that I find Miss Lorimer 
so charming that if I were differently situated I should 
not hesitate to offer myself to her. But” — he flung out 
his hands with a dramatic gesture — ” under the circum- 
stances what can I do ?” 

“Well,” said Craven, coolly, “if by the circum- 
stances you mean that you cannot marry her, I should 
say that you could at least refrain from making your 
admiration so manifest.” 

” But why should I refrain from manifesting what I 
feel with the utmost intensity ? I have never seen any 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


II4 

woman whom I admire so much — whom I could so 
readily adore. She is adorable, Mademoiselle Cecil — so 
noble, so high-minded, so above all coquetry.” 

” She is a very fine type, though a little spoiled,” said 
Craven. ” But what has that to do with the fact that 
a man who does not mean to marry a woman has no 
right to let her see that he ‘ adores ’ her ?” 1 

” I have not shown her that,” said the young Comte, j 
” Yes, you have shown that, not only to her, but to ; 
every one else. And the question now arises. What are j 
you going to do ?” i 

” To do !” The young man stared. ” What is there j 
for me to do ? Ma foi^ you know well how I am placed. 

I have a fortune to retrieve, a future to make, a position 
to maintain. All of these things, which are absolute 
duties, render it impossible for me to follow the dictates 
of my heart.” 

” Then you should keep the dictates of your heart ; 
more under control,” said Craven, dryly. “I am to - 
understand that you have no intention whatever of 1 
offering yourself to Miss Lbrimer ?” 

” How can I have such an intention ?” asked De 1 
V^rac, in a tone of despair. ” You know that with us 
marriage is not a matter of sentiment. I have to think 
of other? beside myself — of the family I represent. And 
yet,” he continued, turning suddenly and beginning to 
walk up and down the floor, ” I confess that I am 
greatly tempted. I have never been so charmed by 
any woman. If she had anything suitable in the way 
of fortune, all might be arranged. Tell me, my friend, 
do you know with any positiveness what dot she * 
has ?” ! 

” I know nothing whatever concerning her fortune,” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


115 

answered Craven, with perfect truthfulness. “ But if 
you wish, 1 will inquire.” 

” Of whom ?” 

” Of herself. Who else could be so well informed ?” 

” Impossible. She would misunderstand. Our 
French ideas and customs seem to your people mer- 
cenary — do I not know that ?” 

” I think that I can obtain the information you ask 
without betraying your interest in the subject. And it 
is well that the matter should be ended, one way or 
another.” 

” Yes, it must be ended,” said the other, gloomily. 
” Find out if you can, then, what. fortune Miss Lorimer 
has ; and if it is any amount which would justify me 
in offering myself to her, no one will ever be more 
grateful to you than I.” 

It was not a desire to win the gratitude of the Comte 
de Verac, however, which made Craven feel that it was 
not an unpleasant task to sound Cecil Lorimer’s inten- 
tions. His own curiosity and interest were very much 
aroused, and the opportunity to learn what she really 
meant to do was too tempting to be resisted. Watch- 
ing, then, an opportunity to speak to her in private, he 
saw her from his window one morning early, walking 
alone down the great avenue of chestnuts which led 
toward the village ; and, hastening out, he overtook 
her. 

” Will you pardon me for running you down?” he 
said rather breathlessly as he came up to her. ” The 
temptation was beyond my power to resist. I saw you 
from my window, and, supposing that you were drawn 
out by the beauty of the morning for a walk, have ven- 
tured to join you.” 


Il6 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

She hesitated for a moment in a manner which led 
him to imagine that he might have made a mistake, but 
the next instant smiled with her usual frankness. 

“ The beauty of the morning did draw me out,'’ she 
said ; “ but not merely for a walk. I am going to the 
village for a purpose. You can come with me if you 
like, but I doubt if you will care to do so when you 
hear where I am going.” 

‘‘Try me,” he answered, smiling, yet curious to 
know where she could be going. 

She colored a little as she said : ‘‘ I am going down to 
the village church. I have a fancy to see it. I liked M. 
le Cure so much when he was at the chateau the other 
evening. And, then, I fell into the habit of going to 
the churches in Paris.” 

‘‘ Oh !” said Craven. It was a very expressive 
sound, and signified many things — among the rest that, 
in the speaker’s opinion. Miss Lorimer was already fit- 
ting herself for the part of Comtesse de Verac. What 
else could this attraction toward Catholic churches 
mean ? But he did not betray these sentiments ; he 
only said that he would be very happy to pay a visit to 
the village church, and added that he too had been 
pleased with the Cure. 

Craven and Cecil found the village of Villemur a very 
pretty place — its houses, scattered among orchards and 
small fields, embowered in shade, and with an air of 
smiling peace and comfort. A bright stream ran 
through the little hamlet, and turned a mill at the end. 
The flashing wheel and the red gables of the house 
made a charming picture, set in a frame of green. The 
church stood at the end of the village nearest the 
chateau. It was old and not unpicturesque, but, like 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. I17 

almost all parish churches in France, bore marks of 
neglect and decay — admirable results of the care of a 
paternal Government. 

When Craven and Cecil entered they found a gray 
interior in which there was very little light or color. 
What there was flowed in through the tall, narrow win- 
dows near the roof. A number of figures were kneel- 
ing on the stone floor ; for the Cure, just vested, was 
about to begin Mass. Craven led his companion to 
one of the wooden benches, expecting her to sit down 
as a spectator of the scene ; and he was not a little sur- 
prised when, instead of this, she knelt. “ The thing 
must be certain !” he said to himself philosophically, 
as he sat down, and, while preserving something of a 
reverential attitude, observed Miss Lorimer out of the 
end of his eye. Her graceful, fashionably dressed 
figure formed a striking contrast to those around her, 
but it was one of which she was wholly unconscious. 
It needed but a glance at her face to show that no one 
of the worshippers near them was more absorbed in 
what was taking place at the altar than this girl, with 
her noble profile, her clear, earnest eye. She watched 
every motion of the priest, as if intently studying it, 
and seeking an answer to some question, some need of 
her soul. The longer Craven observed her the more 
he felt certain that she had not come here from mere 
curiosity, nor yet from any worldly motive such as he 
had at first credited her with, but from a deep and 
eager interest, a desire for some great verity which she 
believed might be found here. 

He was so absorbed in these thoughts and the study 
of her face that he did not notice when the Mass came 
to an end, until she rose and turned toward him. Then 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Il8 

they went out, the bright warmth of the outer day seem- 
ing to meet them with a rush as they emerged from the 
gray old sanctuary. 

“That was very interesting,” said Craven; “but, 
I confess, a little chilly and depressing to me. This is 
more pleasant, do you not think so ?“ 

“ This is delightful,” she replied ; “ but I liked that 
too. It was so picturesque and so full of devotional 
feeling. These old churches affect me peculiarly, quite 
apart from their beauty. There seems an atmosphere 
of faith in them. How devout the people were ! And 
how absorbed the priest was in the Sacrifice he was 
offering ! I seemed to realize this morning that it was 
a sacrifice. One felt it there.” 

She spoke as if thinking aloud rather than as if ex- 
pecting an answer ; but Craven said : “ One always 
feels in these churches the reality of the faith which 
made and fills them. But to share it — that is anothei 
matter. One might be glad to do so if one could, but 
the power of the modern world is too strong with most 
of us.” 

“I forget the modern world entirely when I enter 
such a place,” she said. “ I cannot say, either, that I 
step back into the Middle A.ges, because I simply feel 
as if time did not matter there — as if it were for all time, 
as the needs of human nature are for all time.” 

“ With those sentiments it is likely that some day 
you will become a Catholic,” Craven remarked. 

“ I don’t know,” she answered. “ The religion at- 
tracts me very much, from its passionate reality, from 
the meaning that it gives to human life, and the incen- 
tive to great deeds. But I must learn more of its intel- 
lectual side before I could think of embracing it. I 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


II9 

am not very emotional ; my mind must lead my 
heart.” 

He looked at her with a smile. ” In all things ?” he 
asked. 

” In most things, at least,” she answered ; ” and I 
am not sure that I might not say in all.” 

There was a minute’s silence, as, leaving the pretty 
village street behind them, they walked toward the 
great gates of the park. Then, nerving himself. Craven 
said : ” Will you forgive me if 1 venture to ask what 
your mind says to your heart about becoming Com- 
tesse de Verac ?” 

She regarded him with astonishment for an instant, 
then a faint smile appeared around the corners of her 
mouth. 

” It strikes me that the best reply to your question is 
by another,” she said. ” Why should my mind, or my 
heart either, say anything to me about becoming Com- 
tesse de Verac ?” 

” Because you certainly cannot be unaware of what 
is evident to every one else — the devotion of the Comte 
de Verac.” 

She lifted her shoulders with a Gallic gesture. ” The 
devotion of the Comte de Verac is as evident to me as 
to others,” she said carelessly ; ” but do you imagine 
that I need to be told that it means — just nothing? I 
have not been three months in France without learn- 
ing something of the customs of the country. And in- 
deed before I had been with her three days the Vicom- 
tesse had fully explained to me the position of her 
nephew — whom he was to marry, and how and why. 
Therefore I am able to appreciate the exact value of his 
devotion to me.” 


120 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

“It is a very sincere devotion, I assure you,” said 
Craven. “ You do him injustice if you think otherwise. 
Of course he is in a manner bound by the customs of 
his country and the traditions of his class. But his 
feelings have ignored these things entirely. He is 
ardently in love with you.” 

“ What then ?” she asked. 

“ Well” — the diplomatist found himself hesitating a 
little — “ he is naturally anxious to find some way of 
reconciling his attachment with what he conceives to 
be his duty to his family. You know he is not rich. 
It is necessary, if he is to maintain his position, that he 
shall improve his fortune by marrying. And so — ” 

“ And so,” she said, with the same composure, “ he 
has made you his ambassador to discover if he could 
improve his fortune by marrying mey 

“ Not exactly,” Craven answered. “ I will be per- 
fectly frank with you, for I am sure you are too sensible 
to misunderstand matters. This young man is earnestly 
attached to you ; but, as you have said, you have been 
in France long enough to learn something of the cus- 
toms of the country, and you know that in marriage 
much is considered beside the sentiments of the parties 
concerned. This is specially the case with him, because 
he is the head of his family, and, the estate having been 
much impoverished, he is naturally anxious to restore 
what has been lost. Marriage offers him a recognized 
and approved mode of doing this. Try to put yourself 
in sympathy with the position in order to comprehend 
it.” 

“ I think that I am in sympathy and do comprehend 
it perfectly,” she said. “ Have no fear of my mis- 
understanding anything you wish to tell me.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. I2I 

“ Then what I wish to tell you is that this young man 
is — to use his own foim of expression — in despair over 
his inability to reconcile his attachment to you with his 
duty to his family and his position. He has expressed 
his feelings very freely to me, and I volunteered to 
ascertain if there were no way by which they could be 
reconciled. I was very prudent, however ; give me 
credit for that. I did not even hint to him that the 
whole solution lay in Miss Lorimer’s own hand — that I 
had heard she possessed a fortune which would make 
all things possible.” 

Cecil turned upon him quickly, catching her breath 
with a slight gasp. “ So you have heard it !” she said. 

He laughed slightly. “Yes, I heard it some time 
ago,” he answered ; “ but I did not know whether or 
not to believe that any heiress would so conceal her 
splendor. I am satisfied now.” 

She colored with vexation. “ You did not know 
then,” she said. “ You only suspected, and now you 
have made me betray myself ! Do you call that fair ?” 

“ I call it shamefully unfair,” he replied, cheerfully. 
“ But what does it matter ? I have gratified my curi- 
osity — I confess that I was curious on the subject — and 
your secret is safe with me, if you wish it kept a 
secret.” 

She did not answer immediately, but as she walked 
on at a quickened pace, with heightened color. Craven 
saw she was displeased. 

“ I know what you are thinking,” he said presently. 
“ You are saying to yourself that I am meddling with 
what does not concern me, and that I am very imperti- 
nent beside. I grant that this would be so if I did not 
really have your interest at heart. But should I be 


122 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


your friend if I did not try to serve you to the best of 
my ability ? You know it is proverbial that lookers-on 
see most of the game, and I have been a looker-on who 
has observed a good deal. Shall I tell you what I think 
I have seen ?” 

Already Cecil’s vexation was passing. She looked 
at him with her frank smile, and said : “Yes, you may 
tell me, in order that I may see exactly how great your 
mistakes have been.’’ 

“ Oh, my mistakes ! I have no doubt made any 
amount of them,’’ he answered. “ Still, I think I have 
perceived some things which are facts — for instance, I 
have perceived on one hand a lover held back from de- 
claiing his passion by the circumstances in which he 
stands, and a lady possessing the power to make all 
things smooth, but concealing this fact, and waiting — 
forgive me if I vex you again ! — for a romantic declara- 
tion, which under these circumstances could not come,’’ 

The bright blood sprang now in a tide to Cecil’s face. 
She threw her head back haughtily. “ I am glad,’’ she 
cried, “ that you have proved how little you really know 
about me. / waiting for a declaration, romantic or 
otherwise ! I could laugh at the absurdity of such a 
mistake, if I were not too angry.’’ 

“I am glad that you confess to being angry,” he 
said, smiling. “When people are angry they are not 
always the best judges of things. But, really, what is 
there to be angry at ? I am only crediting you with a 
little romance, and that is not a crime, although there 
are people in the world who think it so.’’ 

“You are crediting me then with something of which 
I have not a fragment. Surely I had a right to be silent 
about my fortune, which concerns only myself. One 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


123 


neea not be romantic to desire to spare one’s self an- 
noyance ; and I knew that if it were known how rich 
I am, I should be annoyed. That is the beginning and 
the end of the matter. As for wishing to test any 
one’s disinterestedness — no such idea ever entered my 
head. I am too well aware of the French customs of 
which you have spoken to have had any fear of a seri- 
ous declaration from M. de Verac. If I wished to 
marry him, I would simply let the Vicomtesse know 
the amount of my fortune, and the affair would arrange 
itself.” 

” Then you do not mean to marry him,” said Craven, 
betrayed by his curiosity and interest into a direct ques- 
tioning which astonished himself. 

But instead of rebuking, Cecil looked at him with a 
half-appealing glance. ” I have been asking myself 
that question,” she said. ” Will you help me to answer 
it ? I think the time has come when I should like the 
benefit of the knowledge which you put long ago at my 
service. You cannot give it to me now, for here we are 
at the chdteau. But we will take the first opportunity 
for a little quiet speech together. Here comes M. de 
Verac. Not another word !” 


124 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XII. 

“l HAVE BEEN TEMPTED.’ 

T he grand salon at Villemur presented a scene in 
the evening which always delighted Cecil. Its j 
splendid proportions, its great carved chimney-piece, | 
its polished floor reflecting the clustered waxlights, its 
mirrors and pictures, made a setting for the groups of ^ 
graceful figures which rendered the whole picturesque j 
in the extreme. The long windows opened on a terrace 
without, which at this time was flooded with moonlight, 
and below which lay the gardens and park, a vision of 
fairy-like beauty. 

It had never seemed more charming to her than on 
the evening after her morning walk and conversation 
with Craven. She realized now that the time had come j 
when she must put out her hand and make all this her j 
own, or else renounce it wholly. She had played with I 
it, as it were — had felt a pleasure in the sense that it * 
might be hers by a word or gesture. It was like act- 
ing a part in a drama to fancy herself transported into j 
this life, chdtelaine of this noble place. But now the | 
hour had come when she was bound to decide whether 
the part was to become real or not ; and, if not, it was 
only right that she should remove herself out of the 
path of a man whom she did not mean to marry. The 
decision made her sad. Villemur had never seemed so 
attractive, so fascinating, as when the need to renounce 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


125 




it was thus sharply felt ; and yet not even Villemur was 
worth the price she would have to pay for it. She felt 
quite sure of that now. 

In this mood Craven found her when he joined her 
after dinner near one of the great windows opening on 
the terrace. On one hand was the long, brilliant salon j 
on the other, the silver, silent night. “ Is it not beauti- 
ful ?” she said, indicating the last with a motion of her 
fan. “ I am tempted to forget I am in France and to 
take a turn without. ” 

“ Come,” said Craven, stepping outside and holding 
back the curtain. ” Even in France we may be per- 
mitted to walk as far as the end of the terrace. It is a 
divinely beautiful night.” 

She followed him after an instant’s hesitation, and 
together they paced the terrace, almost in silence for 
several minutes. Then Craven, glancing from the 
stately balustraded terrace, the wide garden and sleep- 
ing park, to the great front of the chateau sparkling with 
lights, and the brilliant scene revealed through the salon 
windows, said meditatively : 

” And so you are in doubt whether you will accept 
Villemur together with its lord. Do you know that if 
I were a woman in such a position I think I should be 
— tempted ?” 

” Do you suppose I have not been tempted ?” asked 
Cecil. ” More than I like to consider. Everything 
that the worldly side of me likes best is here — great 
position, high rank, picturesque splendor, and the op- 
portunity to use my wealth in the most effective manner 
to augment all these things. Why, this very scene, 
with all it suggests, is a fascination and a temptation ! 
Then I like M. de Verac very well — as much, I suppose, 


126 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


as I shall ever like any man — why do you laugh ?” she 
asked suddenly and rather haughtily of Craven. 

“ Did I laugh ?” he said. “ Pardon me, but I was 
thinking how far from flattering to M. de Verac your 
sentiments toward him were.” 

” If you knew me better,” she replied, ” you would 
know that, on the contrary, they are very flattering. 
He is the only man of whom I have ever said so much, 
or concerning whom I have ever taken into considera- 
tion what I have considered with regard to him.” 

” Well,” said Craven, ” the last fact is certainly flat- 
tering to him ; but I am very sure he would hope to 
inspire a little more warmth of sentiment. However, 
forgive me if I am impertinent. You think him, then, 
the most interesting man you have ever known ?” 

” No,” said Cecil. The word came from her distinct 
and clear-cut in its denial before she even stopped to 
think. It was a sudden, leaping memory which rose 
before her like a vivid picture. She saw the deck of a 
ship, she looked at the long track of silver foam stretch- 
ing across illimitable water, and she heard a voice say- 
ing : ” Your kindness has made this voyage like that 
track of foam across the ocean — a pathway which I 
shall never find again, but which will remain always in 
my memory as luminous and as enchanted as it looks 
now.” The haunting melody of the voice which uttered 
these words seemed sounding in her ears, rendering it 
impossible for her to say that the Comte de Verac was 
the most interesting man she had ever known. But 
within a minute she had qualified her denial ; for she 
felt, not for the first time, an emotion almost of anger 
against the depth of impression which a stranger had 
made upon her. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


127 


“ The mysterious always interests one more than the 
known,” she said. ” Therefore it is natural that a man 
whom I knew for a short time only might interest me 
more than M. de Verac, whom I now know very well. 
There are no longer any mysteries about him to pique 
one’s curiosity ; but he satisfies my taste — which is not 
easily satisfied — and he is a man who would not devote 
his life to ignoble ends.” 

” Believing these things of him,” remarked Craven, 
who began to find this young lady as much of a puzzle 
as her family and friends had already found her, ” why 
do you hesitate to marry him ?” 

“For many reasons,” she answered. ” I wonder if 
I can hope to make you understand them.” 

” I can venture to say for myself that I am not, as a 
rule, very obtuse,” Craven observed. 

She did not reply at once, but stood leaning against 
the massive balustrade, herself a picture in her dress of 
creamy lace, the folds of which seemed of ethereal soft- 
ness in the moonlight, while her beautiful head rose 
above them with statue- like grace. She did not look 
toward the brilliant salon^ but out over the silver-fiooded 
gardens, as she said, slowly : 

” A little while ago I told you that the things which 
M. de Verac offers — or would offer if he knew the 
amount of my fortune — tempted the worldly side of my 
nature, for they are all things which I like extremely. 
I need scarcely say that it is not the mere splendor of 
Villemur which fascinates me — I could build a more 
splendid house myself if I wished to do so — but the 
spell of the past, the associations and traditions which 
throw a charm over it. I have always dreamed of 
doing something great with the power which my money 


128 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


gives me. Unless I can do that, I confess that it is of 
small value to me and can buy little for which I care. 
Now since I have been here I have seemed to see an 
opportunity where it could accomplish much ; but when 
I put it all before myself I think, ‘ Granted all that ap- 
pears possible to be accomplished, what then ? Who 
will really be the better for it in any enduring sense ? ’ 
I am afraid it is a case of anticipated vanitas vanitate7n^'' 
she said, looking at him with a smile. 

“ I believe I understand you,” he said, thinking that 
she was quite the most interesting study in the form of 
a young woman that had ever crossed his path. “You 
would restore Villemur, you would render the house of 
De Verac again one of the foremost in France, you 
would enable the young Comte to become probably a 
noted if not a great man. But having done this, you 
would not feel as if you had really served any very 
lofty end.” 

” No,” she said ; ” for it would all be more or less 
selfish, and would reflect back upon myself. I should 
share in it all, benefit from it all. And I fear that, ex- 
cept M. de Verac, scarcely any one else would be bene- 
fited by it, save very indirectly. Now this is not the 
sort of object that I have always had in view. What I 
should like to do is something that would benefit a 
great number — something in which I would have no 
share except the pleasure of knowing that I had done 
it. Does all this seem to you very foolish ?” 

” No,” Craven answered, ” it seems to me just the 
opposite of foolish. I wish all heiresses had such 
thoughts. But worldly prudence bids me warn you 
that unless you are very cautious they will lead you 
into quicksands of philanthropy. It is possible to make 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


129 


awful blunders, and do much harm, too, in trying to 
benefit one’s fellow-creatures.” 

” I know that,” she replied, ” and I have been cau- 
tious. I do not think that I am yet old enough or wise 
enough to decide what it is best to do. But I don’t 
want to put it out of my power to do anything — I don’t 
want to burden my soul with the life-long regret of a 
lost opportunity. That, I suppose, is why I have never 
thought of marriage as other women think of it. I have 
felt that I wanted free hands when I saw at last the 
opportunity which I have been looking for. I claim no 
credit for these thoughts ; my father taught them to 
me. He never meant to leave so much money to me ; 
he meant himself to do some great good with it. But 
he was cut off suddenly in the midst of a busy life, and 
he had only time to remind me that he left me a great 
responsibility as well as a great fortune. ‘ Use it nobly 
for others, not selfishly for yourself,’ he said ; and, God 
helping me, it is so that I will use it.” 

” Surely God will help you,” said Craven, touched 
to unwonted reverence. ” You told me this morning 
that I did not know you. I find now that you were 
right. How small and petty my idea of you seems 
beside the reality you show me ! Villemur is a noble 
place, Miss Lorimer, but it is not noble enough for you. ” 

” I have no such thought as that,” she answered 
quietly ; “but in saying that Villemur tempted me, I 
think that I put the matter in the right light. It was a 
temptation from what I have always felt to be a duty, 
and so I must put it behind me and go on, not looking 
back.” 

“ May I ask how long you have felt sure of this ?” 
Craven said. 


130 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

“ Only since this morning,” she replied. ” Up to 
that time I was so doubtful that I said to myself — see 
how freely I am talking to you, Mr. Craven ! but I ! 
think you will comprehend if you do not sympathize ; 
with me.” ' 

” I certainly comprehend, and I hope that I sympa- : 
thize with you,” he responded. ” More than that ; I 
am deeply interested in all that you care to tell me of 
your feeling in this matter.” 

” Briefly, then, you know what Catholics believe — 
that God Himself is present upon their altars. Well, 
in my doubt, my uncertainty, I said to myself : ‘ Surely, 
if I go and address Him directly, there where so many 
pious souls believe Him to dwell. He will enlighten and : 
direct me.’ I went, as you know, and while I was ! 
there some strong influence seemed upon me — I could 
not doubt j I could not say to myself as I say now to 
you, ‘ If this is true.’ I felt that, it was true. And if ; 
I never have another such hour of faith again, it is ! 
something to have had it once — something to have 
realized that I was in the immediate presence of God, 
that I could speak to Him with the certainty of being 
heard. I did speak with all the energy of my soul, and 
I believe that I have had my answer. At least since 
then my doubts are at an end. All this” — she waved 
her hand toward the stately chateau and noble park — 
” is but a brilliant temptation, which I must put away 
and go.” 

“lam sorry for M. de Verac,” said Craven ; ” but 
I believe that, whatever power has inspired your reso- 
lution, you are right.” 

” I have no doubt of it,” she said. ” And now what 
I have to ask of your kindness is that you will if pos- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


I31 

sible spare M. de Verac the knowledge of what he has 
lost— of course I allude to my fortune. I hope that he 
will never hear of it. And, in sparing him, you will 
also spare me one of the most painful things which can 
be laid on a woman— the necessity of rejecting a man 
whom she really likes.” 

” I will hold your confidence sacred as far as the for- 
tune is concerned,” said Craven, ” and will endeavor to 
restrain M. de Verac’s ardor ; but, after all, there is a 
great deal of human nature even in French nature, and 
the human nature may triumph over the French nature 
in his case if you do not take your dangerous attractions 
out of his way.” 

‘‘ I am going to do that as soon as possible,” she an- 
swered. ” My friend. Miss Marriott, with whom I came 
over, is at one of the German spas. I have written say- 
ing that I would like to join her. As soon as I hear 
from her I shall bid adieu to the Vicomtesse as grace- 
fully as I can ; and, unless she should hear of my for- 
tune meantime, she will be glad to let me go, for I think 
she begins to consider me dangerous.” 

” There is no doubt of it,” said Craven. ” She is 
trembling — poor woman ! — lest the very best that could 
befall her nephew should befall him. What a lesson on 
our blindness in this life ! I am sufficiently sorry for 
her to hope that she may never learn the truth.” 

‘‘So do I hope so,” replied Cecil. ” One thing at 
least is certain : she will never learn it from me. And 
now that all is clear and settled we must remember les 
convenances and return to the salonj’ 


132 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE 


CHAPTER XIII. 

“ THESE THINGS ARE DONE THROUGH FRIENDS.” 

I T required all of Craven’s diplomacy to manage the 
Comte de Verac, and satisfy his inquiries with re- 
gard to Miss Lorimer. The young man had hoped 
much from his ambassador — the hope inspired by the 
ambassador’s manner rather than his words ; for Craven 
had at the time, as we know, felt very certain of a favor- 
able issue to the matter. He had been very prudent — 
in speech. But something in tone or look had betrayed 
his inward assurance, and prepared the disappointment 
which he now found it hard to soothe. 

” Tell me exactly what you discovered,” said the 
Comte imperiously. ” Let me be the judge whether 
or not there is a hope for me.” 

*‘ It is impossible for me to tell you exactly what I 
discovered,” answered Craven, who began to regret 
the intermediary part he had undertaken, ” because it 
was in a measure confidential. I can only assure you 
that it is impossible for you to think of marriage with 
Miss Lorimer.” 

” On account of her fortune ?” 

” Yes, on account of her fortune,” Craven replied, 
glad that the question had not been ” on account of her 
want of fortune.” Then, conscious of a twinge of con- 
science, he went hastily on : She is a strange girl — 
altogether built on very original lines — and, fortune 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


133 


apart, I do not think that a marriage with her would be 
either for your happiness or hers.” 

” I have great respect for your judgment, my 
friend,” said M. de Verac stiffly ; ” but this is a point 
on which no man can judge for another. If the practi- 
cal side of the affair could be arranged, I should leave 
Miss Lorimer to decide whether or not she could be 
happy with me. There is no question in my mind of 
my happiness with her.'" 

” It is very likely that there is no question in your 
mind,” replied Craven, ” but that is not saying that 
there is no question in fact. And, unless I am much 
mistaken. Miss Lorimer would recognize it.” 

“Did you betray me to her ?” asked the other quickly 
and haughtily. 

” I betrayed nothing,” answered Craven, beginning 
to be irritated in his turn. ” Do you think that your 
sentiments, which have been sufficiently obvious, needed 
any betrayal ? But you may be sure of one thing — that 
Miss Lorimer is not a woman to make mistakes in such 
matters, even if you suppose me capable of making 
them. It was a very delicate business ; I did my best 
for you to spare you awkwardness and pain, and I have 
my reward in suspicion and fault-finding.” 

” No,” said the young man, looking a little ashamed, 
” not that. If I am hasty, you must allow something 
for my disappointment. I have been foolish enough 
to hope much since I talked to you — to think that 
something might be discovered or arranged. I can- 
not resign myself to believe that nothing is possi- 
ble.” 

Craven shrugged his shoulders. ” If you wish to 
satisfy yourself,” he said, “the way is open. I am 


134 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


sure that Miss Lorimer will answer frankly any question 
that you may ask her.” 

” You know that it is impossible for me to ask her 
any question,” replied M. de Verac gloomily. ” One 
cannot go to a lady and say, ‘ Mademoiselle, I should 
like to marry you, but I must first know the amount of 
your fortune.’ These things are done through friends.’ ’ 

” Exactly,” said Craven ; ” and if the friends fail to 
accomplish the impossible, they are not thanked for 
their effort, but blamed for their failure. It is an old 
story, but I forgive you for your ingratitude ; you are 
in love and consequently unreasonable.” 

” I am neither ungrateful nor unreasonable,” an- 
swered the Comte, ” but I am in despair. My hands 
are tied — I can do nothing ; and yet I adore her, my 
friend — I adore her !” 

” Why have you not courage enough to go and tell 
her so, then ?” thought Craven, with a sense of wonder. 
He had an instinct that if this were done — if, risking 
the loss of some ambitions, the young man went to 
Cecil with genuine passion and true tenderness, he 
might, by the all-potent force of strong feeling, con- 
quer her hesitations, and win a reward of which he did 
not dream. But even to hint this was impossible. 
” And, after all,” said the philosopher to himself, ” it 
is better as it is. A mariage de convenance will suit him 
best in the end. The fire of genuine passion is not in 
him ; perhaps it is too much to expect that it should be. 
Few and far between are the men — or women either — 
who have in their nature the power of sacrifice. If all 
passions were put to that test, small would be the num- 
ber great enough to bear it successfully ; and why, 
then, should I wonder that this man does not display 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


135 


what is so rare ? Let him go. No doubt he is good 
enough in his way, but not worthy of Cecil Lorimer. 
No man is worthy of her who would not be willing to 
dare or to sacrifice anything to win her.” 

With these sentiments it is likely that M. de Verac 
did not find him a very sympathizing listener. At least 
the interview ended soon after this ; and Craven ejacu- 
lated with a sigh of relief as they parted, ” Thank 
Heaven, that is over !” 

His interview with the Vicomtesse was more agree- 
able. For one thing, she was always agreeable to him ; 
for another, it was a more pleasant task to end her dis- 
quietude than to listen to M. de Verac’s complaints. 
Seated in her boudoir — an apartment charmingly and 
luxuriously fitted up for her specially — they discussed 
the matter much as they had discussed Cecil’s coming, 
on that bygone spring day in Paris. 

” And you are certain, then,” observed the Vicom- 
tesse, after listening to a report in which only the fact 
of Cecil’s fortune was suppressed, ” that Armand has 
no intention of offering himself to her ?” 

” I am as certain as one can be of anything that de- 
pends on the purpose of another,” Craven replied. 
” He declares that he adores her and that he is in 
despair — ” 

” That of course !” said the lady, with a gesture of 
her fan which meant that it signified nothing. 

” But that he has not the least intention of asking 
her to marry him,” Craven went on. “He seems as 
thoroughly reasonable on the subject, as little disposed 
to romantic disinterestedness, as you could desire.” 

If there was a faint inflection of sarcasm in the last 
words, Madame de Verac did not hear it. Delicate and 


136 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE, 


refined as she was, on this subject the world had ren- 
dered her thoroughly obtuse. Romantic disinterested- 
ness in such a case was for her only another name for 
criminal folly. 

“ It is a great relief to my mind to hear it,” she said. 
” I confess that I have been very uneasy. I know 
Armand well, and the things that have most weight 
with him. But a man in love — passionately in love — is 
for the time insane. He will commit acts of folly, he 
will even make sacrifices of his best interests, which he 
will bitterly repent as soon as he is sane. Wise women, 
knowing this, do not accept such sacrifices ; but many 
women have to learn their wisdom at a bitter cost. It 
would have been too much to expect Cecil to be wise if 
so brilliant an opportunity had been placed before her. 
I am more than glad, therefore, that my fears were un- 
founded, and that she is to be spared the temptation.” 

It required an effort of self-control at this point for 
Craven to repress a smile. He thought of Cecil’s words 
— ” a temptation which I must put behind me” — and 
wondered to himself what the sensations of the Vicom- 
tesse would be if the truth were revealed to her. To 
reveal it being out of the question, he decided to make 
Miss Lorimer’s way as smooth for her as possible. 

” Yes,” he observed, ” things seem for the present to 
have reached a very satisfactory point ; but you must 
let me say that I do not think it would be well to put 
De Verac’s resolution to a prolonged test. He is very 
much in love, and, as you remarked a moment ago, a 
man in love is capable of inconceivable folly. The less 
he sees of Miss Lorimer for some time to come, the 
better.” 

” You are right,’ ’ said the Vicomtesse. ” I have been 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


137 


thinking of that myself. I should like to take her away 
at once, but how can I ? By Armand’s request I am 
here as hostess ; and with this party of people on my 
hands, it is impossible for me to leave.” She was silent 
for a moment, reflecting deeply, her fair brow knitted 
into unusual lines ; then she looked at him and said : 
” Why do we not follow our instincts ? Or, rather, 
why do we follow our impulses ? You remember our 
conversation about Cecil before she came — how I told 
you that I regretted having asked her to come, and 
dreaded the result ? My dread is justified at last. I 
like her — no one could help liking her — but if Armand 
throws away the chances of his life by marrying her, it 
will break my heart.” 

“Have no fear of it,” answered Craven. “ M. de 
Verac has no intention of throwing away any of the 
chances of his life ; and if he were so foolish as to 
dream of it. Miss Lorimer would not allow him to do 
so. Of that I am sure.” 

His listener made a gesture which indicated profound 
incredulity. “ When you say such things as that I lose 
respect for your judgment,” she remarked. “ There is 
no young and ambitious woman who would reject 
Armand and all that he has to offer. You may fancy 
so, but I know better. However, we will not discuss 
what she might or might not do in a situation which 
I devoutly trust may never arise. I must put it out 
of her power as soon as possible to do anything, by 
taking her away. I will go to England, to Russia — 
anywhere to get her out of Armand’s path.” 

“ I hope there will be no need for you to sacrifice 
yourself to that extent,” said Craven, with a smile. 

And indeed it was on the very next day that the 


138 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


mind of the Vicomtesse was set at rest by Cecil her- 
self. 

Miss Marriott’s letter came, full of rapturous assent 
to her request and delight at the idea of her companion- 
ship. “ I did not venture to suggest that you should 
come,” she wrote, ” because you seemed to be enjoying 
your life in France so much, and it is far more brilliant 
than anything you will find with us ; but I have been 
longing for you all the same. I never see anything 
beautiful that I do not wish for you to share it with 
me, for there is no artistic or intellectual pleasure that 
is lost on you. We are going into the Tyrol next week, 
and when it was first spoken of I thought, ‘ Oh, if Cecil 
were only with me, how charming it would be ! ’ Fancy, 
then, my delighted surprise, when I received your let- 
ter. I could scarcely believe my good fortune as I read 
it, so seldom in life do we obtain what we want so 
quickly and so completely. Come, then, immediately. 
Our departure into the Tyrol will be delayed until you 
join us. Shall John meet you anywhere ? He will 
be delighted to do so. Write at once and let us 
know.” 

It was pleasant to be welcomed so warmly, and with 
this letter in her hand Cecil went to seek Madame de 
Verac. She found her in her boudoir with her own 
letters — for after the post came in there was a gen- 
eral separation of the guests with their correspond- 
ence. 

” Do I disturb you ?” Miss Lorimer asked. ” I have 
something here that I would like to speak to you about ; 
but if you are occupied I can wait.” 

” Oh, no !” replied the Vicomtesse, dropping care- 
lessly a note that she was reading. “ These things 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


139 


amount to nothing. What have you there ?” she con- 
tinued, with a somewhat apprehensive glance toward 
I the missive which Cecil held. 

“A letter from my friend Grace Marriott, with whom 
! I crossed the ocean,” was the reply. “You may re- 
! member that I have spoken of her. She is in Germany 
! with her brother and his family, and she writes me that 
! they are going into the Tyrol next week, and would 
I like me to join them. It is one of the countries I desire 
: most to see ; and if you do not object to my leav- 
ing you, I think I will take advantage of the oppor- 
i tunity.” 

With all her worldly training, the Vicomtesse could 
I not suppress the glow of pleasure and satisfaction 
which came over her. Her whole face changed, her 
eyes brightened, she smiled radiantly. ” I could not 
be selfish enough to desire to keep you from anything 
so pleasant,” she said. ” I shall be desolated to part 
with you, but it is only fair that I should spare you to 
your friends if you wish to go. But you will return to 
me again ?” 

” Oh, yes ! I certainly hope to see you again be- 
fore I leave Europe,” Cecil answered. ” My visit to 
you has been altogether charming, and I shall never 
forget your kindness.” 

” If you have enjoyed the time you have spent with 
me / am charmed,” said the Vicomtesse ; ” for your 
companionship has been delightful to me. I am sorry 
that it is necessary for us to part. But you do 
not think of going before our visit to Villemur is 
ended ?” 

” Yes,” answered Cecil, who understood the solici- 
tude beneath this question. ” If I am to join the Mar- 


140 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


riotts before their journey into Tyrol, it is necessary 
that I should start at once. I should not like to delay 
them. Do not think me abrupt in departure if I say 
that I must go to-morrow.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE, 


141 


I CHAPTER XIV. 

l 

AT THE DOOR OF SANT’ AGNESE. 

I T was the 21st of January, the Feast of St. Agnes, 
and from the famous basilica beyond the walls of 
Rome which bears her name a large crowd was pour- 
ing. The High Mass was over, together with the beau- 
) tiful ceremony of blessing the lambs ; and as the multi- 
tude, Roman and foreign, passed out into the open air 
many groups remained in the church — some for pur- 
poses of worship, others for purposes of sight-seeing. 

For not even in Rome is there anything more inter- 
esting than this ancient church. It is one of the very 
few which have preserved unchanged their original 
form and arrangement. As we see it now, so in all 
essential particulars it appeared in the fourth century, 
when it was built by Constantine, at the request of his 
daughter Constantia, on the spot where the body of St. 
Agnes was discovered. Entering down the long flight 
of marble steps which descend from what is now the 
level of the soil to the pavement of the church, we see 
before us, unaltered, an ancient Christian basilica. 
The wide nave, the rows of noble columns, the high 
altar majestically closing the vista, and the confession 
of St. Agnes underneath, where the remains are de- 
posited — what unnumbered generations have gazed 
upon these objects as we see them now ! Rome is like 
eternity for time seems to have no meaning there. 


142 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Kneeling at this shrine, we try to realize the centuries 
which have elapsed since the tender virgin-saint, the 
loveliest flower in the martyrology of the Church, was 
laid here with the same solemn Sacrifice which has hon- 
ored her feast to-day — that beautiful feast which the 
Romans love so well ! But even the imagination fails 
in the effort. What a wide, stormy sea of time stretches 
between that day and this ! What billows of human 
tumult and passion have raged around that Bark which 
carries the Fisherman of Galilee, and which alone has 
crossed in safety the mighty gulf where empires and 
kingdoms, creeds and conquerors, alike have perished ! 

Among the groups left in the church after the crowd 
had ebbed away was one composed of three ladies, who 
were slowly moving from point to point, examining all 
the details of the interior. One was a handsome, stately 
woman of middle age ; the other two, much younger, 
were Miss Lorimer and Miss Marriott. Cecil had 
changed little in the months which had elapsed since 
she left the Chateau de Villemur, and which had been 
spent in pleasant travel through the Tyrol and Austria 
and Northern Italy. On the statuesque white of her 
skin there was seldom any bloom of color, and only the 
clearness of its tint, the brightness of her eye, and the 
elasticity of her step, showed her perfect health and 
buoyant spirits. 

But Grace Marriott had changed much since her voy- 
age across the Atlantic, To her delicate face a wild- 
rose color had come ; she had gained flesh as well as 
strength in mountain rambles, and looked altogether a 
different being from the girl who left the shores of 
America. At present, however, she had the air of one 
who is a little cold and a little bored. Pulling her furs 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


143 


closer around her — and there is no place where furs are 
more agreeable than in a Roman church — she once or 
twice suggested departure to her companions, but they 
were too much absorbed to heed her. The elder lady 
was pointing out in the church all the features most 
interesting to antiquarians, and Cecil was listening 
with rapt attention. Grace Marriott shrugged her 
shoulders a little as she walked along. Her artistic 
sense was pleased by the picture which the beautiful 
interior made. The shafts of light falling through the 
double range of columns to the marble pavement, the 
golden lights burning like stars around the tomb of the 
martyr, the rich blending of color from porphyry and 
mosaic — these things charmed the eye. But she cared 
less about the story which they told ; while to Cecil 
there was interest in every detail which proved the 
great antiquity of the basilica, a significance in every 
ancient column, every fragment of old mosaic. 

“ How can people doubt what the primitive Church 
was like when they come to Rome !” she said, while 
'they paused near the entrance for a last look before 
going out. Round the high altar faint wreaths of in- 
cense-smoke were still hanging ; its fragrance filled the 
building, together with the aromatic odor of the green 
boughs with which, in Roman fashion, the pavement of 
the church was strewn. Cecil stooped and lifted a 
spray of box, which she placed in the front of her dress. 
“ I will keep this,” she said, ” in memory of St. 
Agnes.” 

Two ladies who were passing out just before them 
overheard the words ; and one — a pale, pretty girl — 
looked at her with a glance so sweet that it was like a 
smile, although her lips remained grave. The glance 


144 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Struck Cecil — for no moment is too short for us to re- 
ceive an impression, good or bad, from the fellow- 
creature whom we meet therein — and she said to her- 
self, “ What a lovely face !” while she wondered when 
and where she had before seen dark eyes which could 
smile like these. 

When they reached the top of the flight of steps, and 
emerged from the church, they found the two ladies 
who had preceded them gazing round rather blankly. 
Only one caniage was in sight, and that was Miss Lori- 
mer’s. As she motioned for the coachman to drive up, 
she noticed that the girl whose face had interested 
her looked very white, and heard her companion — an 
elderly lady — say : “You had better go back into the 
church, and sit down. I will walk into Rome, and 
bring a carriage for you.” 

“ Oh, I think that I might walk ! It is not very far,” 
said the girl, looking wistfully down the road. 

But the other answered decidedly : “ No, you must 
not undertake it. I should only have you fainting on 
my hands, which would be worse than waiting here — ^ 
though the church is cold. I am sorry we have delayed 
so long.” 

“ I am shivering now,” said the girl. “ I will wait 
here in the sunshine until you send a carriage for me, 
if you really think you must.” 

But at this point Cecil, after exchanging a glance 
with her companions, stepped forward. “ Pardon me,” 
she said, addressing the young lady, “ but we are driv- 
ing straight into Rome ; and if you will accept a seat 
in our carriage, we shall be very happy to take you with 
us. It will be better, I think, than remaining here.” 

“Thanks! You are very kind,” replied the girl, in 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


145 


a voice as sweet as her eyes ; and then she looked at 
her companion as if to ask what she must do. 

The elder lady — there could be no doubt that she was 
a lady, despite the plainness of her dress and a certain 
brusqueness of manner — replied to the look by one com- 
prehensive glance at Cecil, after which she said : “ We 
are really very much obliged to you. My daughter is 
not able to walk into Rome, and our carriage has de- 
serted us. Therefore, since you are so kind, I think 
I she had better go with you.” 

” I am sure of it,” said Cecil. ” She looks quite 
; cold. I am sorry,” she added, ” that I have not an- 
other seat to offer — ” 

“I should not care to accept it if you had,” inter- 
rupted the other, with the brusqueness of manner 
already mentioned. ” I am a very good pedestrian, 
and the walk is nothing to me. But for my daughter 
I am exceedingly obliged. She will give you our 
address. Good-day !” 

She nodded, and walked off toward Rome at a pace 
which justified her own description of herself as a good 
pedestrian. Cecil smiled, and said to the young girl : 
” Come, here is our carriage.” 

It was a handsome private carriage, and as the young 
stranger sank back into the luxurious seat she said : 
‘‘This is indeed better than returning into the cold 
church to wait and shiver for another hour.” 

‘‘And what a cold church it is!” said Grace Mar- 
riott. ” What cold churches they all are, except St. 
Peter’s ! Surely these Romans must have a wonderful 
fire of piety to keep them warm during their long 
prayers.” 

‘‘ They are not only very pious, those who are pious 


146 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


at all,” answered the stranger, ” but they are not accus- 
tomed to luxurious heating arrangements anywhere. 
Their homes are almost as cold as the churches.” 

” It certainly is not a place to come for comfort in 
winter,” observed Mrs. Severn. ” My experience is 
that, unless one goes to the tropics. Southern climates 
are snares and delusions in the matter of warmth in 
winter. There are times when they are delightful, but 
again there are times when one suffers keenly from 
cold.” 

” But would one put a little discomfort — such as 
shivering when one enters a marble church which was 
built to exclude heat, and therefore must be as delight- 
ful in summer as it is frigid in winter — in comparison 
with such a sky, such a sun, such a scene as this ?” 
said Cecil, looking around her. ” And who would 
have missed the function to-day because the grand old 
basilica was not heated by patent furnaces and regis- 
ters ? That scene, with all its beauty and its poetry, 
carried one back to ages when such things were un- 
known, but when people had ardent faith, great pur- 
poses, marvellous genius — ” 

” My dear Cecil, we know all that,” interposed Mrs. 
Severn, laughing softly ; ” but really it does not pre- 
vent one from shivering. Even your enthusiasm can- 
not always keep you warm.” 

” I have no enthusiasm at all,” Cecil protested, 
‘‘only a sympathetic perception of things ; and when 
these are great things, I cannot be conscious of small 
ones. But here we are in Rome” — as they rolled 
through the Porta Pia — ‘‘ and if you will give me your 
address,” she continued to the girl before her, ‘‘ we will 
take you home at once.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


147 


The young lady mentioned an address near the Foro 
Trajano, and then said, as the carriage turned in that 
direction : “ May I ask to whom I am indebted for so 
much kindness ?” 

“ The kindness is not worth mentioning,” said Cecil, 
” but I am very happy to tell you who we are. This 
lady is Mrs. Severn, our chaperon, guide, philosopher, 
and friend ; here is Miss Marriott, and I am Miss Lori- 
mer. Perhaps it may be worth while to add that we 
are Americans.” 

The dark, sweet eyes rested in turn on each person 
named. Then their owner said : 

” I fancied that you were Americans — from your 
accent, you know. I am an Irishwoman — Miss Tyrcon- 
nel.” 

” Tyrconnel !” repeated Grace Marriott and Cecil in 
one breath. They looked at each other, after which 
Miss Lorimer said : 

” Pardon us, but your name recalls a very pleasant 
acquaintance we made in crossing the ocean. He was 
a Mr. Tyrconnel, and an Irishman. Is the name com- 
mon in Ireland ?” 

” Not at all,” was the reply. ” I do not know any 
family bearing it except our own. It may have been 
my brother whom you met,” she added after an in- 
stant’s pause. ” He returned to Ireland from New 
Zealand last May.” 

” And was on board a vessel which had an accident 
with an iceberg ?” 

” Yes ; it delayed his arrival and made us very un- 
easy. I remember now that he spoke of an American 
party with whom he enjoyed the voyage very much. 
Were the party ?” 


148 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“Yes,” answered Miss Marriott, “I think we may 
safely say that we were the party ; but such a collective 
memory is not altogether flattering. I am afraid we 
have remembered Mr. Tyrconnel better than he has 
remembered us.” 

“ Oh, no !” said the young lady eagerly. “ I assure 
you that he spoke of you most warmly and said that 
he owed to you the pleasantest days he had spent for 
years. Poor Gerald ! he has not had many pleasant 
ones of late, and he came home to a world of trouble. 
An Irish landlord has not a bed of roses in these days, 
you know.” 

“So he is an Irish landlord !” said Miss Marriott. 
“ He told us very little of himself.” 

“ There was little that was pleasant to tell,” replied 
Miss Tyrconnel, with a sigh. “ It was only a sense of 
duty which brought him back to Ireland ; he did not 
want to come. It was a most trying position which 
awaited him, and its trials have not grown less with 
time. I wish he would give up the struggle and come 
away, but he will not. It is not in Gerald to surrender 
what he believes to be a duty ; he will die first.” 

“ Is there any question of his dying ?” asked Cecil. 

She was sorry for the question the next moment, 
when she saw how the girl to whom she had addressed 
it shrank, and how pale her cheek and lips grew. But 
she controlled herself, and answered quietly : 

“ When matters are in the condition in which they 
now stand in Ireland, there is always a question of 
what lawless men have done and may do again. But 
Gerald is very brave and God is good, and I try not to 
think of terrible possibilities. Understand,” she went 
on quickly, “ that I am not speaking of his tenants. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


149 


They recognize that he is trying to undo past evils and 
make things better. But the secret societies — the men 
who have been led into crime by deep and bitter wrongs 
— no one who incurs their enmity is safe. But Gerald 
does not wish me to dwell on these things, and I try 
not to do so. ” 

The carriage drew up at this moment before the great 
arched portal of an old palace, and the speaker rose. 
“ This is where we have our apartment,” she said. 
” Cannot I tempt you to enter ? No ? Well, pray give 
me your address, that mamma and I may call. 1 am 
so very glad to have met you, and I want to cultivate 
your acquaintance if you will allow me to do so.” 

“We shall be delighted to cultivsite yours,'* said Miss 
Lorimer, producing her card. ” Here is our address. 
Pray come soon.” 

Then, with cordial salutations, they parted. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


150 


CHAPTER XV. 


“ MY SON AND I DO NOT AGREE.” 

NE knows that the world is a small place/’ said 



Grace Marriott, as the carriage rolled toward 


the Piazza di Spagna, near which their lodgings were ; 
” but really one is not always prepared for the realiza- 
tion of its extreme smallness, as exemplified by the 
manner in which we run against acquaintances, and 
the friends and relatives of acquaintances, in the most 
unlikely regions. But I am glad to have heard of Mr. 
Tyrconnel again. I always thought he would reappear 
somewhere.” 

“But he has not reappeared,” said Cecil; “and, 
according to his sister’s account, he is more likely to 
be shot in Ireland than to appear in Rome.” 

” Oh, well, one has heard of him, at least !” said 
Grace ; ” and one knows where to place him. I hate 
for anybody whom I have liked to drop out of my life 
in that mysterious manner. He might have been a con- 
spirator from the mystery he maintained about himself.” 

‘ ‘ Reticence is not mystery, ’ ’ observed Cecil. ‘ ‘ There 
was no reason why he should have explained his affairs 
to us. I remember I said so at the time.” 

” There was no reason, as it appears, why he should 
not have explained who and what he was. It is rather 
unfortunate to be an Irish landlord under existing cir- 
cumstances, but not disgraceful.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 151 

“ You heard what his sister said — that he came home 
to a position of difficulty and trial. That made him 
reserved about it, no doubt. There are people who do 
not care to talk of painful and disagreeable things.” 

” His sister resembles him very much,” said Grace. 
” I had almost forgotten his face until hers recalled it.” 

‘‘She looks very delicate,” remarked Mrs. Severn. 
‘‘ But there is something quite attractive about her.” 

‘‘ I was struck with her face in Sant’ Agnese,” said 
Cecil. ‘‘ It has a very peculiar charm. I am afraid I 
might not have thought of asking her to come with us 
but for that.” 

‘‘ There is no charm, peculiar or otherwise, about the 
mother,” said Miss Marriott. ” I think from her man- 
ner she must be an Englishwoman. The Irish are not 
usually so brusque.” 

The conversation dropped at this point, for the car- 
riage rolled under the portone of their own house — that 
is, of the house in which they had established them- 
selves for the winter — and alighting, the three ladies 
passed up a broad staircase to their apartment on the 
first floor. 

It was a very spacious and handsome apartment — 
such as only a person of wealth could have inhabited, 
yet not so magnificent as to necessarily argue great 
wealth. Cecil was very careful to avoid any display 
which could draw attention to her fortune. The apart- 
ment was taken in Mrs. Severn’s name, and she paid all 
bills, appearing altogether as head of the party. This 
was by Miss Lorimer’s special request, made when she 
agreed to act as chaperon to the two young ladies dur- 
ing a winter in Italy. It was a very agreeable request 
to the woman, who had never taken such a position 


152 A WOMAN OP FORTUNE. 

before, and was afraid she might become in the eyes of 
the world a mere companion. That would have been 
hard to her ; for she was not only a lady by birth, but 
she had moved for a long time in a very brilliant social 
atmosphere, and was widely known. Her husband, a 
man of letters and of science, and of a social charm 
more powerful than either, had lived for years in those 
cities of Europe where cultivated society can best be 
secured, had himself cultivated this society untiringly, 
had been esteemed one of the most delightful men of 
his generation, and when he died was found to have 
lived so much beyond his income that he left scarcely 
any fortune at all. His widow, therefore, reduced to 
very narrow means, made her home in one of those 
German towns where narrow means are considered to 
go farther than anywhere else in the world ; and here, 
through the Harriotts, Miss Lorimer met her. They 
liked each other at once ; the girl with her quick, eager 
intellect and the woman with her careful culture found 
themselves very sympathetic, and soon the idea entered 
Cecil’s mind of going to Rome for the winter, with 
Mrs. Severn as chaperon and Grace Marriott as com- 
panion. 

“ I think we would make a very nice party,” she said 
to the latter, to whom she spoke first of her plan. 
” When you remarked not long ago that you would 
like to spend the winter in Rome, I determined to ask 
you to do so — as my guest, of course. I had already 
decided to set up my Lares and Penates there for that 
length of time, if I could make any suitable arrange- 
ment. The trouble was the question of chaperonage, 
for we could not defy the proprieties by going alone ; 
and I have a horror — simply a horror — of entering into 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


153 


any close association with people with whom I am not 
thoroughly sympathetic. Now, I have studied Mrs. 
Severn closely ; the more I see of her the better I like 
her, and I intend that she shall go with us.” 

” It is a charming plan,” said Miss Marriott. ” For 
myself 1 can only say that I shall be delighted to go. 
But I doubt if you can induce Mrs. Severn to accept 
such a position. Frankly, I should not like to ask her 
to do so. ” 

” I will ask her,” said Cecil, ” and you shall see that 
she will accept. I flatter myself that I have a little 
tact.” 

She did not add that she had a great deal of some- 
thing else, though no doubt she relied on it even more 
than on her tact ; and indeed it was the liberal com- 
pensation offered which tempted Mrs. Severn to run the 
risks involved in accepting the position. Yet so much 
may be said, that the money would not have tempted 
her to take charge of any one whom she did not like, 
or whose social position was not thoroughly unexcep- 
tionable. She did like Cecil Lorimer exceedingly, how- 
ever ; and certainly nothing could have been pleasanter 
than that young lady’s way of putting things. 

” Understand that it is to your establishment, dear 
Mrs. Severn,” she said ; “and my name is not to be 
mentioned in connection with it any more than Miss 
Marriott’s. We are simply two young ladies whom 
you are kind enough to take charge of. I am selfish in 
this, you see ; for, whereas I am nobody over here, you 
are very much somebody, and can make us acquainted 
I am sure with many charming people. So remember 
you are to set up your salon in Rome ; I am to be 
allowed to share in the advantages of it, and to supply 


154 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


the sinews of war as a small compensation. But that is 
to be strictly our secret. Never whisper to any one that 
you know or suspect me to have a good deal of money.” 

“The girl is romantic,” thought Mrs. Severn, as 
Craven had thought before her. Aloud she said : “I 
think, my dear, that I have sufficient discretion not to 
betray anything which you would like kept secret. But 
you must not think that what you have said blinds me 
to your kindness with regard to myself. You are offer- 
ing me in the most delicate manner the opportunity to 
enjoy again for a little while a life which I enjoyed per- 
haps too much when I possessed it” — here a few tears 
were wiped away — “ but it is an opportunity which I 
could not accept if I had not — fallen in love with you, 
I should say if I were not a prosaic old woman.” 

“ Do I not know it ?” said Cecil, smiling. “ I always 
know when people like me. And do you suppose I 
should make such a proposition if I had not fallen in 
love with you also ? Therefore, with such a satisfac- 
tory state of feeling between us, I think we can safely 
set up an establishment together.” 

So it was that the establishment in Rome became an 
accomplished fact, and had gone on in the most har- 
monious manner up to the time when we found the 
party in Sant’ Agnese. 

Miss Tyrconnel very soon fulfilled her promise to 
call. The next day when the ladies came in from their 
afternoon drive they found her card and that of her 
mother. “ So sorry to have missed you !” was pen- 
cilled on the former. 

“That is a charming girl,” said Miss Marriott. 
“We must cultivate her for her own sake as well as for 
her brother’s.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


155 


“ I am at a loss,” said Cecil, ” to know why we 
should cultivate her for her brother’s sake at all,” 

” Because we liked him so much,” replied Grace. 
” Is not that a good reason ? Perhaps you have forgot- 
ten how agreeable he was. But I, who have not met 
any fascinating Frenchmen in the interval, remember 
very well.” 

Cecil laughed. ” I also remember Mr. Tyrconnel 
very well,” she remarked ; “but if I had no such 
memory I should wish to see mor« of his sister. Let 
I us return this visit very soon.” 

A few days later their carriage again drew up before 
the dark, massive entrance of the old palace near the 
i Foro Trajano. They were directed to the second floor 
for the Tyrconnel apartment ; and mounting thither 
the door was opened for them by an Italian servant, 
who received their cards, and ushered them into a salon 
with a more cheerful aspect than might have been ex- 
pected — where a bright fire was burning and the air 
was filled with the fragrance of violets. Only a few 
minutes elapsed before Miss Tyrconnel entered, and, 
seen thus without her out-door wraps, both visitors 
were painfully struck by her fragility of appearance. 
She was indeed the slightest creature possible to im- 
agine — slenderly built, with very little flesh, and a skin 
so transparent that it was like fine porcelain. Her face 
recalled her brother’s, as Grace had said, but was a 
refined and delicate copy of it. The lines of brow, 
nose, mouth, and chin were exquisitely moulded, while 
the clear, pale complexion, the dark hair and large 
dark eyes, were traits in which certain Celts strongly 
resemble Spaniards. 

” I am so very glad to see you !” she said, meeting 


156 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


her visitors with winning cordiality. “ I was disap- 
pointed at finding you were out when mamma and I 
called ; but unfortunately that is an accident to be ex- 
pected if one does not know on what day to call.” 

“ I hope that it will not occur again with you,” said 
Cecil. ” Thursday is our day. But we have run the 
same risk, you see, and have been more fortunate ; for 
we have found you at home.” 

” I am not very often anywhere else,” she answered. 
” I am something of an invalid — which is the reason we 
are here — and I go out very little.” 

” That is a great privation when one is in Rome,’” 
said Miss Marriott. ” Do you not feel it so ?” 

The soft, dark eyes looked at her with a smile. ; 
” Yes,” said Miss Tyrconnel, ” it is a privation ; but I 
have so many compensations that I do not think of 
what I miss so much as of what I gain. Even with lim- 
itations, Rome is the most fascinating place in thei 
world.” 

” You have been here before ?” asked Miss Lori- 
mer. 

” Oh, yes, often ! Therefore, you see, it is not as if 
I did not already know it well. And I have many 
friends — real Roman friends — who come to see me and 
make my life very pleasant. But here is mamma, who 
was as sorry as I not to find you at home the other 
day.” 

” I wanted to thank you again for your kindness to 
my daughter,” said Mrs. Tyrconnel, coming forward to 
shake hands with Cecil first. ” She tells me, too, that 
you are friends of my son.” 

” We met Mr. Tyrconnel on shipboard,” said Miss 
Lorimer ; ” and after having passed through some 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


157 


danger with him, we felt as if we knew one another 
very well.” 

” And we liked him exceedingly,” added Grace Mar- 
riott, who thought this statement rather cool. ” He 
was so very kind and pleasant.” 

” Oh, yes, he is always that !” said his mother, in a 
matter-of-course way. ” I remember the accident which 
delayed his return. It was a critical time, and his 
presence was very much needed — but he was not to 
blame for the delay.” 

Her tone suggested that he might be blamed for 
other things. 

” He was very much worried by it, I think,” said 
Cecil ; ” but it was one of the cases in life where im- 
patience is of no use. On land, if a journey is inter- 
rupted one can find various expedients for getting on — 
charter a train, if necessary — but at sea nothing of the 
kind is practicable. One is at the mercy of the waves 
and the captain.” 

” We were all too glad to escape with our lives to be 
impatient on that occasion,” said Grace. 

” Yes, it was a narrow escape,” observed Mrs. Tyr- 
connel, absently. Then she looked at her daughter. 
” Kathleen, have you ordered tea ?” she asked. 

Miss Tyrconnel responded by ringing the bell. A 
servant came in with the tea-tray, and soon the fragrant 
beverage which has become an afternoon necessity was 
handed in delicate cups of lovely old china, together 
with plates of small, dainty cakes. 

As Cecil drank her tea and trifled with a cake she 
talked to Mrs. Tyrconnel, who rather excited her inter- 
est. Evidently she was a woman of very strong indi- 
viduality. Her appearance denoted this unmistakably. 


158 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

It was not from her that either son or daughter had 
inherited his or her classical delicacy of feature or 
dreamy softness of eye. Her face was strongly cut, 
though not unhandsome ; her dark eyes were full of 
fire, and her whole expression and aspect breathed pas- 
sionate feeling and imperious will. What, then, was 
the meaning of the coldness and hardness with regard 
to her son which her tone and manner betrayed ? 
Cecil remembered enough about him to feel sure that 
he was not one to provoke antagonism causelessly, and 
she was conscious of a curiosity which led her to turn 
the conversation to the subject of Ireland. 

“ It is a country,” she said, ” which I have always 
regarded with great interest, and which I should like 
to visit, but I fear that this is not a good time to see it.” 

” If you want to see the lakes and the mountains and 
the ruins — and that, I suppose, is what you mean by 
Ireland — this is as good a time as any other,” answered 
Mrs. Tyrconnel. ” There are people who fancy that it 
is dangerous to go into Ireland, but this is a great mis- 
take. Strangers are in no danger at all ; it is only 
those who belong to the soil and have lived on it for 
generations who are liable to be assassinated, because 
they will not yield their just rights.” 

” Indeed !” said Cecil, politely and vaguely. She 
found that the fire was very near the surface, and that 
she had no difficulty in rousing it. ” One hears a great 
deal of the wrongs and sufferings of the tenantry,” she 
went on after an instant ; ” but no doubt it is a very 
trying position, that of an Irish landlord.” 

“So trying,” said Mrs. Tyrconnel, “that our best 
efforts are treated with ingratitude ; and at the least 
attempt to exact one’s own, one is practically reduced 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


159 


to a state of siege, and liable at any moment to be 
shot.” 

” Oh !” cried Cecil. The exclamation escaped her 
involuntarily, and she put down her cup of tea rather 
abruptly. ” How miserable you must be, then, to 
think of your son !” she said, quickly. 

Was it her fancy that Mrs. Tyrconnel’s lip curled a 
little scornfully ? ” Gerald is not likely to be in dan- 

ger,” she said, coldly. ” He is not strong enough to 
defy the peasants and the demagogues who are con- 
trolling them. He is paltering with them, yielding 
rights which he ought to defend with his last breath, 
squandering his inheritance in socialistic experiments — 
my son and I do not agree on these questions. Miss 
Lorimer,” she added, brought suddenly to a realiza- 
tion of how strangely what she was saying must sound 
by the startled expression of Cecil’s face. ” He has 
chosen to cut loose from all the traditions of his class 
and his family, and to enter on new paths which I 
totally disapprove. Consequently I have left Ireland, 
and I may never go back. The climate does not suit 
Kathleen, and she has suffered terribly from the ner- 
vous tension of the last few years. She is better away 
from there.” 

” I cannot admit that, mamma,” said Kathleen, gen- 
tly. While talking to Miss Marriott, she had plainly 
been listening with one ear to her mother’s conversa- 
tion. ” I can never agree that any place is better for 
me than Ireland.” 

“You are a foolish girl, then,” said her mother; 
‘‘>and other people must be wiser for you than you are 
for yourself.” 

Her whole tone and manner changed, however, as 


i6o 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


she said these words. It was evident that if her son 
roused the hardness of her nature, her daughter brought ^ 
out all its softness. There was a glimpse of family 1 
complications in these accidental revelations, which 
seemed to give Cecil the mot de V enigme of much that she 
remembered in Tyrconnel. Had he not hinted at some , 
hard, unwelcome task which awaited him — a task in which j 
duty might be arrayed against the tenderest suscepti- 
bilities of others ? She recalled the very words in which « 
he had spoken, and how she had seen the sensitive fibre | 
of the man shrink from the responsibility of the burden 
and its pain. A glimpse of both had been given her, 
and she felt saddened — she hardly knew why — as she < 
rose to take leave. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

“he could not yield.” 

I T was on one of the Thursdays when Cecil had said 
that they were always at home that she saw the 
Tyrconnels next. The large, handsome salon was well 
filled when the mother and daughter entered ; for Mrs. 
Severn had many friends of many nationalities, and 
numbers of them had found her out in her pleasant 
quarters. There was a murmur of conversation on the 
air ; but as the names of the newcomers were an- 
nounced, Cecil detached herself from a group of which 
she seemed to be the centre, and came forward to wel- 
come them — to find a seat near the fire for the delicate 
girl, who looked like a pale flower in her furs, and to 
present Mrs. Tyrconnel to Mrs. Severn. Then, leaving 
the elder ladies together, she came back and sat down 
by Kathleen. 

“ This is very good of you,” said the latter, smiling, 
“ since I see that so many people are anxious to engross 
you” — there had been several attempts to detain Miss 
Lorimer on her way across the room. “ But I am glad 
that you can spare me a few minutes ; for I want to 
tell you that I have had a letter from Gerald to-day, 
and he is so pleased that I have met you, and begs to 
be remembered to you, since you are kind enough to 
recollect him.” 

“ We must have made a much slighter impression on 


i 62 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Mr. Tyrconnel than he made upon us, if he fancied that 
we were likely to forget him in such a short interval of 
time,” said Cecil. ” I hope that he is well.” 

” He does not say that he is not,” answered the girl, 
a little sadly ; ” but I know that he cannot be very well 
when he is so much troubled. And the worst of it is 
that for fear of troubling me he says little or nothing of < 
what he is doing and feeling. Ah,” — she sighed — “I j 
would give so much if I could be with him ! — if I had . 
not been obliged to leave Ireland this winter !” ; 

” But your health made it necessary, I suppose,” said i 
Cecil. 

The dark eyes looked at her with something pathetic 
in their expression. “I am never very strong,” was' 
the reply ; ” but my health is no worse in Ireland than 
here. There were other reasons, which seemed to make ^ 
it necessary.” She paused a moment, then added with 
quick wistfulness, ” I heard mamma talking to you of 
Gerald the other day, and I fear that she (unintention- 
ally, of course) may have given you a wrong impression . 
about him. You know, when people differ very widely 
in opinion it is hard for them to understand one an- ' 
other, and hard for some natures to be patient with 
what they do not understand.” 

‘‘Yes, I know,” said Cecil. ‘‘ It has always seemed 
to me that sympathy — the sympathy which compre- 
hends, and tolerates because comprehending, even that 
which it does not agree with or approve — is the rarest 
thing in the world. And the lack of it makes half the 
misery of life.” 

‘‘ I am sure of that,” answered Kathleen. ” I have 
seen so much of it — so much of the intolerance which 
wants to crush all that is opposed to it, and will not 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


163 


even believe in the good intentions of others. It was 
that which drove my brother from home. He could 
not be neutral — no man who is a man can be so in 
Ireland now— and the result was bitterness of feeling 
between my uncle, my mother, and himself. It made 
things very hard on both sides, and so Gerald went 
away. He was our uncle's heir, however ; and when 
he died Gerald was forced to come back — to find 
mamma as much opposed to him as ever." 

“lean realize how difficult the position- must have 
been,” said Cecil — and indeed her sympathy saw, felt, 
and understood it all. “A hard nature does not feel 
these things," she went on. “ Even if it does not enjoy 
opposing others — and some people positively do enjoy 
opposition — such a nature is so intent on what it be- 
lieves to be best that it has no heed for the opinions or 
feelings of others. But for a sensitive nature — one 
that has the finer sentiments of consideration and sym- 
pathy — to be forced into opposing those whom it would 
like to shield from pain, there can be nothing harder 
laid on one in the name of duty.” 

“ How well you understand !” said Kathleen, looking 
at her with eyes full of surprise and admiration. 
“ That is just how it is with Gerald. To do what is 
disagreeable or painful to others always costs him more 
I than to make any sacrifice of his own wishes. But you 
know there was a duty involved to others as well as to 
himself — he could not yield.” 

“ Yes,” replied Cecil. She was eager to ask the 
nature of this duty, and how he was fulfilling it, but 
her quick eye saw that she was needed elsewhere, and 
she knew that she must defer the further unfolding of 
the Tyrconnel problem to a more convenient season. 


164 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ I am sorry,” she said to her companion, ” that I am 
forced to go now ; yonder are some people to whom I 
7nust talk. But you will let me introduce some of our 
friends to you. There is one whom I think you will 
like. He is quite a talented young artist — one of Grace’s 
special friends.” She beckoned as she spoke to a 
young man, who caught her gesture, and came forward 
from the other side of the fireplace, where he had been 
watching herself and Miss Tyrconnel, while languidly 
joining now and then in the conversation of a group 
near by. 

” Are you really going to recognize me at last ?” he 
asked, as he crossed the hearth rug with quite a change 
of manner and expression. ” I began to think I was to 
get nothing but a nod from afar.” 

” Oh, I have a great deal to say to you presently, 
but just now I called you over to take my place !” an- 
swered Cecil, smiling. ” Miss Tyrconnel, let me pre- 
sent Mr. Erie.” 

” It is a very difficult task Miss Lorimer gives me — 
that of taking her place,” observed the young man, as 
he obediently sank into the seat which Cecil had 
vacated. ” And it is made more difficult by the fact 
that you seemed both so interested in what you were 
saying ; I have been observing you for ten minutes.” 

‘‘Yes, we were interested,” said the pale, pretty 
Irish girl ; ‘‘ but I do not think it can be hard to inter- 
est Miss Lorimer, she is so frank, so sympathetic, she 
comprehends so easily things which most people do not 
comprehend at all.” 

‘‘ She is a splendid creature,” said the young man, 
with a good deal of enthusiasm, ‘‘and intellectually 
very stimulating ; but her sympathy has limitations.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 165 

“ Have we not all limitations ?” asked Kathleen. 
“ Has not every one les defauts de ses qualites 2" 

“Naturally/' was the reply; “but you spoke of 
sympathy as Miss Lorimer’s dominant quality, and I 
spoke of its limitations — not of its betraying her into 
weakness, as one’s dominant qualities usually do. 
With regard to some things she is not sympathetic at 
all.’’ 

“ I am sure they must be unworthy things, then,” 
said Cecil’s new friend. “ I cannot believe that any- 
thing noble would ever find her insensible to its influ- 
ence.” 

“ That is just it,” answered the other. “ She is 
sometimes a little intolerant of things which she thinks 
are not noble — or, if not intolerant, at least thoroughly 
unsympathetic.” 

“ I am glad you have modified your term,” said Miss 
Tyrconnel. “ Intolerant I am certain she could never 
be, but we are all unsympathetic toward things which 
we do not like.” 

“Yes,” assented Mr. Erie, “but one expects more 
from some people than from the generality of the 
world. They give so much that one looks for them to 
give all. That is how it is with Miss Lorimer.” 

Kathleen smiled. “ If I may ask,” she said, “ what 
are the things in which you have found her unsympa- 
thetic ?” 

He shrugged his shoulders. “ Oh, toward some 
ideals of conduct, some standards of opinion ! The 
moral strain is just a little too strong in her. A certain 
rigidity always goes with that, you know. For exam- 
ple, she thinks more of the utilitarian element in life 
than of art and beauty.” 


i66 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ I see !” said Miss Tyrconnel, amused. “ I am 
afraid you belong to the school that would not allow 
much of the utilitarian in life at all. Do you not think 
that there may be some limitations to your sympathy ?” 

An answering gleam of amusement came into his lan- 
guid gray eyes. “ I have no doubt of it,” he answered. 
” We are all limited more or less, as you reminded me 
a moment ago. But do not understand me,” he added 
a little hastily, “as criticising Miss Lorimer. No one 
admires her more than I do. She impresses me like a 
fine piece of classic sculpture — as made for noble uses 
altogether.” 

” It is in that manner exactly that she impresses me,” 
said Kathleen. 

” Have you known her long ?” asked the young man, 
a little curiously. 

She shook her head. ” No ; this is only the third 
time I have met her. But I think what Madame 
Swetchine says is true — that ‘ we only know those per- 
fectly whom we divine at first sight.’ ” 

‘‘Yes, that is true, I think,” said her companion, 
meditatively. ‘‘ At least I am seldom deceived in my 
first impression — when I receive one. There are not 
many people capable of giving one, however.” 

He longed to add, ‘‘ You have given me one,” but it 
was impossible to venture on such a personal remark. 
With all her gentleness, Miss Tyrconnel had an air of 
dignity which no one could mistake, least of all Lionel 
Erie, with his delicate, trained perceptions. He led 
the conversation, therefore, away from the dangerous 
ground toward which it was verging ; and, since they 
both knew Rome well, there was no lack of matter for 
talk between them. There was something very attrac- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


167 


tive about the young man — under his affectations an 
almost boyish enthusiasm breaking out now and then, 
a quick response to anything noble in fact or sugges- 
tion ; in short, that unconscious charm of the many- 
sided artistic nature, which no worldly training can 
wholly disguise. Those who had known him in the 
days when he had bent before the charms of Prince 
Waldegrave’s beautiful daughter, found a great change 
in him ; but in reality it was a very superficial change. 
Under the languid indifference of the man of the world, 
the same ardent, uncalculating disposition was to be 
found by those who knew him well. 

Kathleen thought him very pleasant ; for her own 
simplicity made it absolutely necessary for those who 
met her on any familiar ground to be simple also. 
They were talking quite animatedly when Grace Mar- 
riott came up to them. 

“ How do you do. Miss Tyrconnel !” she said. “ I 
have been trying to get over here to speak to you ever 
since you entered the room. Is it not strange that the 
people one wants to see always come at the same time ? 
Mrs. Severn certainly has an army of friends, and Cecil 
and I have to do duty in entertaining them. Some 
repay one, others — do not. But one must take the 
social chaff and wheat together, I suppose.” 

” That is a view from which I dissent entirely,” said 
Erie. ” I never take mine together, if I can possibly 
separate them. ” 

” But it is not often possible,” observed Miss Tyr- 
connel ; “at least not without selfishness and some- 
times rudeness. One owes a debt of courtesy even to 
the tiresome, you know.” 

“Pardon me,” he answered, “but I do not know 


i68 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


anything of the kind. It opens such very unpleasant 
vistas. How can I tell, for example, that you are not 
merely tolerating me from a mistaken sense of social 
duty at present ?” 

“ There is nothing more likely,” said Miss Marriott, 
with a laugh. ” You had better go, therefore, and an- 
swer the summons which Alice Lyndon’s eyes have been 
sending. over here for the last ten minutes. You will 
be quite certain of not boring her'' 

” You forget that there might be something of the 
kind on the other side,” he answered. ” But in order 
to relieve Miss Tyrconnel — ” 

He bowed and went away laughing, while Kathleen 
was still protesting against such an interpretation of 
her words. 

” He has many charming qualities,” said Grace, look- 
ing after him, ” and great artistic talent ; but I am 
afraid that he will never accomplish much. He has not 
sufficient incentive for exertion. It is a pity sometimes 
to have too much of this world’s goods.” 

“■It is often very much of a pity,” answered Miss 
Tyrconnel. ” It can stifle spiritual as well as artistic 
life. But yonder is mamma beckoning, and I must go. 
First, though, let me say that I should like to see some- 
thing of your work, Miss Marriott. You know you told 
me that you are an artist.” 

” A student of art — which is quite a different thing,” 
said Grace. ” I have no work worth showing ; but if 
you are interested in art, how would you like to visit 
some of the studios ? In a few of them there is very 
good work being done, and I know most of the artists.” 

” I should be delighted. There is nothing I would 
like better.” 


A WOMAN OP FORTUNE. 


169 


“ Then we will arrange it as soon as possible. Cecil 
or I will let you know what day we can go, and if it 
suits you we will see what modern art has to say for 
itself in this home of ancient art.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


T70 


CHAPTER XVII. 

“ I WANT SOMETHING.” 

I T strikes me,” said Cecil, ” that modern art is 
almost an impertinence in Rome.” She uttered 
this remark in a thoughtful tone as a party, consisting 
of Mrs. Severn, Miss Marriott, Miss Tyrconnel, and 
herself were driving up the winding road which leads 
to the Pincian, after several hours spent among the 
studios of the most noted artists in Rome. 

” My dear Cecil !” exclaimed Grace. ” Is that the 
impression which the work we have been looking at 
makes upon you ?” 

” My dear Grace, don’t be shocked,” replied Cecil. 
” I know that some of it is very good work ; those Cam- 

pagna studies of R , for instance, are admirable. 

But it all has a certain rawness of tone to eyes that have 
been gazing for months at the mellow tints of the mas- 
ters. And, then, the triviality of the subjects ! Will 
art never again find an inspiration worthy of it ? I 
never enter an exhibition of modern paintings (and 
what we have seen this afternoon has impressed me in 
the same way) without feeling it a pity that genius and 
training — the long, laborious training of the artist — 
should be wasted on such subjects as one generally 
sees.” 

Miss Tyrconnel looked at the speaker with a gleam 
of responsive comprehension in her eyes. ” I, too. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


I7I 

have often felt that,” she said. ” Except those who 
devote themselves to the study of nature, modern artists 
seem to have no inspiration worthy of art, one might 
say.” 

” Well, of course there is a lack of great subjects,” 
remarked Mrs. Severn. ” But where could they go to 
find them ? Art is like literature — hopelessly stranded 
on the commonplace, and only trying to depict that as 
truthfully as possible.” 

“You are all very unjust,” said Grace ; ” for where 
art in the Middle Ages had only one great field of ex- 
pression, art has now a thousand fields ; for ‘ nothing 
that is human is alien to it.’ ” 

” That is just it,” observed Miss Tyrconnel, in a low 
tone. ” It is all so distressingly human that seldom if 
ever do we catch a gleam of the divine.” 

” Modern art does not recognize the divine,” said 
Mrs. Severn. ” There must be faith behind work to 
make it effective, and our artists, like our writers, are 
filled with the spirit of their time — the spirit which has 
descended from God to man.” 

” The spirit which aims to paint for men the life of 
their kind,” said Grace. 

” But what a life !” exclaimed Cecil. “It is either 
hopelessly trivial or more hopelessly sad. Greek 
tragedy is not more terrible than the face of human life 
as modern art, whether painted or written, shows it to 
us — without a hope or a meaning behind its struggle 
and its suffering.” 

‘‘You forget nature,” said Grace. ‘‘We owe all 
study and interpretation of that to modern art.” 

‘‘ Yes, and for that, I confess, we owe it a boundless 
debt,” answered Cecil. ‘‘ But for the training of mod- 


172 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


ern art we might not be able to recognize all the ele- 
ments of beauty in this scene,” she added, as they drove 
up to the Piazzale, and saw outspread before them that 
wondrous panorama of Rome — the Campagna and the 
mountains — which has no equal in the world. 

And it was just then the moment when this picture is 
most beautiful. Behind St. Peter’s the sun was going 
down in a sea of gold, against which the vast outlines 
of the dome — ” that work of man which alone has some- 
thing of the grandeur of the works of God” — stood in 
majestic relief ; while a flood of radiance gilded the 
figure of the angel on the Castle of San Angelo, and a 
soft, luminous mist lay over the city, with its palaces, 
domes, and towers. The sky was of exquisite color — 
tender, lucid, radiant where it touched the azure heights 
that bounded the horizon. 

” Could anything be more beautiful ?” said Cecil, 
with a soft sigh. ” And what a spell, what a charm in 
the soft beauty ! One feels nothing like it anywhere 
else.” 

” There is but one Rome,” observed Kathleen. 
” Modern Goths and Vandals are trying to destroy it, 
but they cannot succeed as long as stands” — and 

she pointed to the marvellous dome of the Leonine city. 

“Can one fancy Rome without it?” said Cecil. 
“ All history for a thousand years centres there. One 
must be blind, deaf, stupid beyond comparison not to 
know and feel it. I sometimes think that I should like 
to see the man who is the inheritor of such a majestic 
tradition,” she added slowly ; “ but then, again, I am 
afraid — ” 

“ Of what?” asked Kathleen, as she paused. 

“ Of having an ideal destroyed. It is such a marvel- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


173 


lous position that it seems to me a man would have to 
be specially created in order to fill it worthily. Just 
think of all that he embodies, of all that he must carry 
of power and influence ! He alone of all men declares 
to the world that he is the Vicar of Christ ; he alone 
claims to s^eak infallibly by the direct inspiration of 
the Holy Ghost ; he alone is the head and ruler of that 
ancient Church which formed the modern world, and 
to him alone were given the keys of the Kingdom of 
Heaven — No ; if one thinks of all these things, one dare 
not see the man who claims such an august and unique 
position !” 

“ Have more courage,” said Miss Tyrconnel, smiling. 
” Come and see the Holy Father. I think I can safely 
promise that you will not be disappointed.” 

Cecil shook her head. ” No one can guarantee me 
against that,” she answered. ” I know my own capaci- 
ties for disappointment too well.” 

” I have no doubt they are very great,” thought 
Kathleen, struck by the words. 

But before she could speak Cecil suddenly uttered an 
exclamation and leaned forward. ” Surely,” she said 
to Mrs. Severn, ” I cannot be mistaken — is not that 
gentleman yonder Mr. Craven ?” 

” Where ?” asked Mrs. Severn, looking around rather 
vaguely — which, considering the number of men in 
sight, was not surprising. 

But Cecil was spared the attempt to indicate ; for 
the man in question, who for some time had been ob- 
serving the occupants of the carriage with the scrutiniz- 
ing attention of a near-sighted person, now crossed the 
road deliberately and came up to them, proving to be 
indeed no other than Craven himself. 


174 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Mrs. Severn — who was an old friend of his — and Miss 
Lorimer greeted him warmly ; he was presented to the 
others, and then, leaning against the carriage, he said 
to Cecil : 

“ This is an unexpected as well as a very agreeable 
surprise. I had no idea of meeting you her5. I fancied 
you in Germany.” 

” Cannot other people travel as well as yourself?” 
she asked, smiling. ” I think I lefty^^u in France.” 

“Yes,” he replied, significantly, ‘ and some others 
also. Things were dull at Villemur after you left. I 
did not remain very long. By the way, I saw Madame 
de Verac the other day in Paris, and she made many 
inquiries about you. I was sorry that, having even less 
knowledge than herself, I could not answer any of 
them.” 

” I have not written to her for a long time,” said 
Cecil. ” I suppose I ought to do so. But I exhaust 
myself in answering the inquiries of Nellie and Jack. 
Nothing that I can say seems to disabuse their minds 
of the apprehension that I shall certainly get into mis- 
chief. Honestly, Mr. Craven, has not Jack been writ- 
ing to you and asking you to keep an eye on me ?” 

” If he has,” said Craven, ” it was because he did not 
know what an excellent eye you had already upon you” 
— he bowed to Mrs. Severn. 

” I am at a loss to imagine why Miss Lorimer should 
be supposed to need an eye upon her at all,” said that 
lady. ” I have found her discretion personified.” 

“Tell Jack that when you write,” said Cecil to 
Craven, with a laugh. 

A few more words were exchanged ; then, as the sun 
sank and the air grew chill, they parted, with a promise 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


175 


on Craven’s part to see them soon ; and the ladies 
drove downward into the city. 

“ You will come in and take a cup of tea with us ?” 
said Mrs. Severn, turning to Miss Tyrconnel as the car- 
riage drew up at their archway. 

“ No, thanks,” she answered ; ” not this afternoon. 
If you will kindly let the carriage drop me at the Church 
of the Trinitdde’ Monti, there will be no need to detain 
it longer.” 

” But yes,” interposed Cecil quickly, ” there will be 
need to detain it until you are ready to be driven home. 
May I go with you to the church ?” she added impul- 
sively. ” Or are you going on some private matter ?” 

” Come by all means,” answered Kathleen. ” I am 
only going to Benediction.” 

” I am very fond of Catholic ceremonies of worship,” 
Cecil explained as they drove toward the church. 
” They are so poetic, so beautiful, so fully in accord 
with the doctrines taught. I like to go to them, al- 
though of course I do not understand all the symbol- 
ism. ” 

” It is very easily understood,” said Miss Tyrconnel. 
She hesitated for an instant, then added : ” You are, 
I suppose, a Protestant ?” 

” Am I ?” said Cecil thoughtfully. ” I don’t know. 
It seems a very poor thing to be — one who merely pro- 
tests. I would rather affirm. But in the sense that I 
am not a Catholic, and that my immediate forefathers 
were Protestants, I suppose I might be called one.” 

The religious Irish girl hardly knew whether to be 
amused or shocked at her tone. ” Have you really no 
faith of your own ?” she asked. 

” I have never felt equal to formulating one,” Cecil 


176 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


answered ; “although nothing is more common, I be- 
lieve. Half the people I know have made up a creed to 
suit themselves, but I cannot have faith enough in my 
own infallibility to accomplish anything of the kind. In 
knowledge of God I want something more certain than 
the mere opinions of myself or any one else.” 

“ Then why are you not a Catholic ?” asked the 
other quickly. 

“ Why not ?“ repeated Cecil. She seemed asking the 
question of herself, and after a moment she answered : 
“ Because I have never had an impulse of conviction 
and feeling strong enough to make me one. This seems 
strange to you, no doubt. I cannot expect you or any 
other Catholic to understand it. I have had moments 
of something like illumination, when I seemed to see a 
great harmonious whole of faith and worship ; but 
those moments passed, and neither my mind nor my 
heart was roused sufficiently to think of doing anything. 
Yet I want something ; do you know what it is ?’’ 

“ Perfectly,” answered Kathleen. “It is instruc- 
tion.” 

They both laughed, and as the carriage stopped at 
this moment there was not time for more words. They 
descended and entered the church, which was well 
filled, but lighted only by the brilliant radiance of the 
altar. As they went in there was a pause in the services 
— what had gone before Cecil did not know — then a 
chorus of sweet voices began to sing ; the tabernacle 
door swung open ; the jewelled monstrance holding 
the spotless Host and flashing a thousand rays of light 
was lifted to its throne, while priest and people pros- 
trated themselves before it. Miss Tyrconnel was 
pleased to see that Cecil knelt. She gave her one sweet 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


177 


glance, and then, lifting her eyes to the “ saving Vic- 
tim,” became absorbed in her own devotion. Cecil, 
looking at her now and then, thought she had the air 
of one who is rapt away from the world of sense. Her 
face, her whole attitude, breathed only adoration and 
entreaty. ” What would I not give for faith like that !” 
thought the observer with something like a pang. She, 
too, lifted her eyes. And what was it that she saw 
amid the jewels and lights ^nd flowers — only a white 
wafer or the Body of the Lord ? What was it the voices 
were singing now ? — 

Praestet fides supplementum 
Sensuum defectui. 

The words struck on her listening ear like a message ; 
she covered her face with her hands, as if dazzled by 
sudden light. For a moment faith did supply the de- 
fects of sense. She realized, as she had realized once 
or twice before, what those around her believed ; but 
even then she said to herself, ” It will not last.” 

When they were in. the carriage again she said to her 
companion : ” I never suspected myself of being emo- 
tional in the least until I entered Catholic churches. 
But they have an effect on me which has surprised 
myself. When I am there — especially when I am under 
the influence of that strange Presence which seems to 
dwell on your altars — I feel and believe things which I 
do not feel and believe elsewhere. How can one ac- 
count for that except on the ground of being easily in- 
fluenced through the emotions ?” 

‘‘/should account for it,” answered Miss Tyrconnel, 

‘‘ in a very different way. I should say that faith, which 
is a pure gift of God, is knocking at your heart, but 


178 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


that your mind fights against it. You have no in- 
tellectual conviction ; you have never, probably, 
heard a reason why we should believe the truths of 
faith.” 

“ Oh, yes, I have !” Cecil replied. ” In Paris I 
heard many of the great preachers, and intellectually 
I never enjoyed anything more.” 

” Perhaps there was too much of the intellect in it,” 
said Kathleen. ” I think you need a special treatment. 
Will you come some day and let me present you to a 
man who is not a great preacher, but who has a peculiar 
gift of winning souls to God ? You need not hesitate to 
see him. He will urge nothing on you.” 

” Why should you think I would hesitate ?” asked 
Cecil, with surprise. ” I am not afraid to hear and be 
convinced, if that be possible. On the contrary, if your 
friend can convert me, I am at his service. I shall cer- 
tainly come. Could such a state of feeling as I had in 
that church be made lasting with me, I should feel as 
if wings had been given to bear me over the world.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


179 


CHAPTER XVIII. 


“come and see.” 


HEN Craven saw Cecil again, he told her that 



V V the marriage of the young Comte de Verac with 
Mademoiselle de Mirecourt had been arranged, and was 
to take place in the spring. 

“ There was a period of despair over your loss, in 
which he was quite refractory,” he said ; “ but the 
Vicomtesse managed him admirably. He was finally 
brought to hear reason, but I sincerely hope that he 
may never learn all that was involved in the loss.” 

“So do I,” she answered, “if it would give him a 
moment of unnecessary bitterness. There is nothing 
for him to regret, however, in his own conduct. I un- 
derstood his position perfectly, and he could have 
gained nothing by acting differently.” 

“ That of course will always be a doubt in his mind 
should he learn what was withheld from him. He will 
think then, ‘ Had I boldly put my fate to the touch, 
I might have won.’ ” 

She shook her head. “ No,” she said, as firmly as if 
she were answering M. de Verac himself, “ he would not 
have won. If I ever doubted that for a moment, I was 
sure of it when I went away. One sees things in better 
perspective from a distance, you know.” 

“ The fascination of Villemur was less apparent, no 
doubt,” answered Craven, smiling. “ 1 may be allowed 


i8o 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


to say that, since you resisted it so bravely on the spot. 
And now tell me what are you doing here ? You are 
certainly settled very charmingly, and my old friend 
Mrs. Severn is a chaperon who leaves nothing to be de- 
sired. Even Jack would be satisfied with your entour- \ 
age^ I think.” 

” He asked you to report upon it, I am sure,” she 
said, with a laugh. “Is it not rather surprising that 
he and Nellie have such a deeply rooted distrust of my 
ability to conduct myself ? Because I do not spend • 
money exactly as every one else does, and have perhaps ■ 
let fall one or two hints of how I should like to spend * 
it, they think me capable of anything wild, wilful, and ^ 
visionary.” 

“ It is the penalty one must always pay for a little ' 
originality, a little unlikeness to the vast mass of one's 
fellow-creatures,” answered Craven, shrugging his 
shoulders. “ But you must allow me to remark that if : 
Mr. and Mrs. Bernard are anxious concerning you, I am 
very curious. I, too, have my fears and doubts as to 
the success of your great ideas.” ! 

“ So have I,” she said frankly ; “ and therefore, as 
you perceive, they remain ideas and have not become 
facts. But here comes Grace just in time to entertain 
you, for I have an engagement with Miss Tyrconnel 
this afternoon.” 

“You should not have allowed me to detain you for 
a moment,” observed Craven, rising to shake hands 
with Miss Marriott. He had already been very much 
struck by the young artist, and was not sorry for an 
opportunity to cultivate her acquaintance. 

Leaving them talking amicably over their cups of 
tea, Miss Lorimer went to keep an engagement which 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. l8l 

she now began a little to regret. It had been under an 
impulse that she had said to Kathleen that if the state 
of feeling she had known in the church could be made 
lasting with her, she was ready to present herself as a 
subject for conversion. Now the impulse had vanished, 
the glow of feeling was partially forgotten, and a sense 
of reluctance to “ commit herself” — that shrinking from 
conviction as from the imposing of a yoke of possibly 
painful duty — came over her, as it comes over many of 
those without the Church, who are drawn toward it by 
a mysterious attraction, yet held back by a reluctance 
they are often unable to define. But she had promised 
to go on this particular afternoon to meet the priest 
whom Kathleen wished her to see. ‘ He is half French, 
half Irish, which makes a delightful whole,” the latter 
had said ; “ and he has lived for years in Rome. I 
know you will like him.” 

That she should like him was quite possible, Cecil 
knew ; for she had already met several Roman ecclesi- 
astics, who had delighted her ; but to meet such men 
on a purely social ground was one thing, and to be pre- 
sented to one of them as a subject for proselytism was 
quite another. It had been many days since she had 
felt so much ” out of sorts” with herself as when she 
descended from her carriage at the foot of the stairs 
leading to the Tyrconnel apartment. ” Do I look like 
an ‘anxious inquirer,’ I wonder?” she said to herself 
as she slowly mounted upward. 

But when she entered the salon of the Tyrconnels she 
forgot to consider anything about herself, so pleasant 
were the aspect and social atmosphere of the room. 
Round the fire were assembled a group consisting of 
two or three ladies, an elderly man whom a glance 


i 82 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


showed to be a priest, Mrs. Tyrconnel and Kathleen, 
while a low murmur of voices and laughter met the ear 
with a soft rush of sound when the door opened. 

As Miss Lorimer came forward, with her striking 
presence, every one looked at her ; the ladies put up 
their eyeglasses, and a quick glance was exchanged 
between the ecclesiastic and Kathleen. Mrs. Tyrconnel 
received her cordially, and presented her to Lady Some- 
body and the Contessa Somebody else — neither name 
was heeded by Miss Lorimer, although she hardly 
needed the titles to assure her of the social rank of their 
bearers. Then Kathleen claimed her, carried her over 
to her corner of the fireplace, and introduced the Abbe 
Ravoux — “ my special friend of whom I told you,” she 
said to Miss Lorimer. 

The Abbe bowed with the grace of a courtier, although 
it was only his manners which were courtly. In figure 
he was small almost to insignificance, and people were 
apt to think him plain until they caught the light of his 
eye and the sweetness of his smile. He smiled now as 
he looked at Kathleen. 

” It is very good of her to speak of me as her special 
friend when she has so many,” he said to Miss Lorimer. 
” I hope that I am not insensible to the distinction.” 

” Miss Tyrconnel can never have much trouble in 
making friends,” said Cecil. “If I may judge by 
myself, she gives a glance and that is enough.” 

” And how is it with yourself ?” asked Kathleen, lay- 
ing her hand with a caressing motion on that of the 
speaker. ” Is not a glance sufficient with you also ? I 
am sure it has proved so in more cases than mine. Is 
it not a little singular, M. TAbbe, that I should have 
met Miss Lorimer by the merest chance, and received a 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 183 

kindness from her which led to our acquaintance, with- 
out knowing that she was the lady with whom my 
brother crossed the ocean, and about whom he had 
talked to me so much ?” 

“ There are many things which in our shortsighted- 
ness we call chance that are not chance at all,” an- 
swered the Abbe. “You cannot tell how much you 
and Miss Lorimer are destined to influence each other. 
She may have crossed the ocean and you may have left 
Ireland for that meeting at Sant’ Agnese.” 

The eyes of the two girls sought each other with 
something magnetic in their glance. “If so,” said 
Cecil, involuntarily, “ I know from whom the good will 
come. ” 

“ No, you do not know,” replied the Abbe. “ Good 
sometimes comes from sources which we think very 
unlikely. But in this case I have no doubt it will be 
reciprocal,” he added, with one of his charming smiles. 

“ I really do not see,” said Cecil, with a touch of 
humility which was very sincere, but which sat strangely 
upon her, “ how any possible good can come to Miss 
Tyrconnel from me^ but I am willing to admit the pos- 
sibility of any amount from her.'' 

“ I have already said that you cannot tell,” rejoined 
the Abbe before Kathleen could utter her disclaimer. 
“ You will do her good, for one thing, if you give her 
an opportunity to help you toward a comprehension of 
this world which lies around you, and which must be a 
very strange world to you.” 

“ Not so strange, perhaps, as you think,” said Miss 
Lorimer. “ Since I have been here I have realized how 
it is that in Rome no one is a foreigner. There is some- 
thing so universal in the spirit which fills these vast 


184 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


basilicas ! They seem made for nothing less than 
humanity, ” 

The Abbe looked at her with a glance which Kathleen 
knew meant sympathy and approval. “ It is well,” he 
answered, ” that you are able to feel these things — very 
well for yourself. Many of those who have been brought 
up in alien traditions are unable to feel them. And 
nothing can be more sad than the narrow and distorted 
views which even some of the most intelligent people 
entertain. Human history has no meaning for them, 
for here is its centre. They miss all the grandeur of 
that great conception of Christendom which made the 
Vicar of Christ reigning in this Eternal City the key- 
stone of its majestic arch. If they know that from 
Rome went forth the spirit which made the modern 
world, the fact seems to tell them nothing. The past 
has no voice for them, and the present no meaning. 
They do not feel what you have so well expressed in 
saying that no one can be a foreigner in Rome who 
does not alienate himself.” 

” Yet there would be no Rome without the Holy 
Father,” remarked Kathleen, in a tone of soft re- 
proach ; ” and Miss Lorimer does not wish to see him.” 

” But I told you why not,” said Cecil. “It is be- 
cause the conception is so great that I fear to see it in- 
adequately realized. It is impossible, you know,” she 
added, addressing the Abbe, “ that any man could 
realize fully the ideal of the Vicar of Christ.” 

“ To that,” answered the Abbe quietly, “ I can only 
reply, ‘ Come and see.’ I was saying to Miss Tyrcon- 
nel before you entered that I can obtain a place for her 
in a party of ladies who are to be presented to the Holy 
Father to-morrow, if she desires it.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


185 

“And I said,” added Miss Tyrconnel, ” that I would 
desire it especially, if I could persuade you to accom- 
pany us.” 

Cecil hesitated for an instant, but only for an instant ; 
then she smiled brightly. ” How can I resist,” she 
said, ” when you are so kind ? And really I think I 
should like to go very much if it were not for fearing 
the loss of an ideal.” 

“You will not lose it,” replied the Abbe, with the 
same quietness. ” I promise you that.” 

” Did I not tell you so ?” said Kathleen. ” I am so 
glad you have consented to go ! Shall mamma and I 
call for you on our way to the Vatican to-morrow ?” 

“If you will be so good,” Cecil answered. ‘‘And 
pray tell me exactly what to wear.” 

‘‘ A black dress, and a black lace mantle on your head 
— that is all. Going to the Vatican will make me think 
so much of Gerald,” she continued, looking at the Abbe. 
‘‘ He was with us when we went last. It was just before 
he left home.” 

The Abbe nodded. ‘‘ I remember,” he said. ''Apro- 
pos^ tell me how he is getting on. He has undertaken 
a great deal, but he has a brave heart to carry it 
out.” 

Kathleen cast a quick glance across at her mother, 
and lowered her voice as she replied : ‘‘ He writes to 
me that he is of late somewhat encouraged. It was 
terribly up-hill work for a time, you know. He found 
it so hard to win the confidence of the people. They 
had been so estranged by the old policy ; and when he 
changed, they fancied at first that it was only from 
fear. They thought that until he had to defy some of 
the desperate ones. Since then they have begun to 


i86 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


understand him. But it seems hard that while they do | 
there is one who will not.” 

It did not need another glance at her mother to tell 
who was in her thoughts. 

” These things cannot be helped,” said the Abbe 
kindly. ” Life would be too easy for us if even the 
good that we try to do were not misunderstood — often ■ 
by the people whose disapproval hurts us most. That 
is the cross in the work ; else it would be too agreeable 
to have the pleasure of doing so much good as your ; 
brother surely will.” 

‘‘As he surely hopes to do,” replied Kathleen, but] 
she spoke a little sadly. ‘‘There are many things to j 
hinder him. Old abuses cannot be reformed in a day. j 
I wish that I were there to help him ; for I could help ; 
the people know me better than they know him.” 

‘‘Patience,” observed the amiable Abbe. ‘‘Your: 
time will come ; and meanwhile you can help him here 
as well as there. Remember that there is an angel of 
prayer as well as an angel of works.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XIX. 

AT THE FEET OF THE VICAR OF CHRIST. 

I T was with a sense of tremulous expectation which 
surprised herself that Cecil waited, the next day, 
i for the arrival of the Tyrconnels to go to the Vatican. 

^ She had spoken truly in saying that she shrank from 
seeing the Holy Father for fear he might not fulfil the 
I exalted ideal which her imagination had formed of his 
, office and of himself ; yet she was conscious also of a 
strong attraction drawing her toward him. It was as if 
some great need of her nature was awake and hoping 
to find a response in “ those fatherly hands whence 
blessings flow.” 

She was so full of the thought that she had no atten- 
tion to spare for her own reflection in the large mirrors 
of the salon, as she paced to and fro in her black lace 
draperies. But Lionel Erie, who came in unexpectedly, 
and, as was often his habit, at an unconventional hour, 
uttered an exclamation of artistic delight when he saw 
her. 

” By Jove,” he said, ” you must really let me paint 
you in that dress ! I never saw anything so becoming. 
But why — oh, I know, of course ! You are going to 
the Vatican.” 

“Yes,” answered Cecil, smiling, “with Mrs. and 
Miss Tyrconnel. Should you like to go ?” 

“ Very much — if only to study you in that costume. 


l88 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

And Miss Tyrconnel will be worth seeing also. What 
a Spanish look she has ! It is astonishing how many 
Irish faces are of the Iberian type. I find her very 
charming.” 

” Who could find her otherwise ? She is lovely in all 
respects.” 

” Why did not you and Miss Marriott bring her to 
my studio ?” he asked, in a tone of injury. ” I heard 
of you in several ateliers^ but I was not thought worthy 
of a visit.” 

” Well, you know,” was the quiet reply, “we were 
showing her pictures and not bric-a-brac. If it had 
been the latter we should certainly have gone to you.” 

“ How outrageous and insulting !” he said, but he 
could not forbear laughing. “ And you are mistaken, 
too. I have a few pictures on hand. One I have been ■ 
painting at with tolerable steadiness lately, and I should \ 
like you to see it. Will you not come some afternoon, j 
bring Miss Tyrconnel, and take tea with me ?” 

“ I have no objection if Mrs. Severn and Grace have ^ 
none. You can arrange the matter with them.” 

“ And Miss Tyrconnel — will you arrange it with 
her?” 

“ I will endeavor to do so. Yes, Giacomo” (as a ser- 
vant entered and announced the waiting carriage) ; - 
“ I am coming.” 

She turned, and taking up a pearl rosary from a; 
table near by, slipped it on her wrist. « 

“ That gives the last picturesque touch to your ap-' 
pearance,” said Erie, who was watching her admir-; 
ingly. “ I suppose you are taking that to be blessedji 
for some Catholic friend.” j 

“ Perhaps so,” she answered, as she moved toward 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


189 


the door. Then she paused abruptly. “ No,” she 
added ; “I am taking it to be blessed for myself. I 
don’t know why I should hesitate to say so.” 

” I am sure I don’t,” he rejoined, candidly. “I 
5 have an immense admiration and respect for the Santo 
I! Padre myself. If I could, I would give him back his 
temporal power to-morrow, if only to save what remains 
of the picturesque and the venerable in Rome. Art 
owes an immense debt to the Vatican, and I for one 
j never fail to pay it in the homage of my gratitude and 
I respect. Present those sentiments for me to His Holi- 

I ness.” 

He said the last words laughingly as they reached 
the carriage waiting at the foot of the stairs, and saw 
just the picture he had expected in Kathleen’s lace- 
draped, Spanish-like head. 

” What is it you are sending to the Holy Father, 
Mr. Erie ?” she asked, smiling. 

” My respectful gratitude for the appreciation and 
patronage which his predecessors have always extended 
to art, and for having ordained such a charming cos- 
tume for ladies who attend his court,” answered the 
young man, with a glance which pointed the words. 
” I have been asking Miss Lorimer to let me paint her 
in it, and I should like to extend the request to yourself.” 

“ We will allow you to do so when His Holiness ap- 
points you court painter,” said Cecil, as she entered 
the carriage. ” Here I am,” she added, as they drove 
away, ” but not, I assure you, without much inward 
trepidation. It is a pity to have too vivid an imagina- 
tion. If I did not realize so clearly what the Pope is, 

I should not feel so much awe of him.” 

” A very convincing proof that you are not a Catho- 


190 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


lie,” said Kathleen. ” We have no such awe — although 
we know what he is — because above all and over all he 
is to us the Holy Father.” 

” And he is so fatherly in manner, ” observed Mrs. 
Tyrconnel, ” that no one can feel any uncomfortable 
awe after seeing him.” 

Cecil had her own opinion on this point, but she did 
not express it ; and after a quick drive across the city 
they passed over the Ponte San Angelo, entered the 
Leonine City, and drove through its narrow mediaeval 
streets, passed the great piazza of St. Peter’s with its 
flashing fountains, and drew up in one of the courts of 
the Vatican, where an open doorway was occupied by ' 
the Swiss Guards. 

The ladies, descending from their carriage, passed 
up a magnificent staircase to an antechamber, where 
they were received by servants of the papal household 
in crimson liveries, and ushered into a large and lofty 
salon^ in which a group of about twenty persons were 
already assembled. j 

Most of these were ladies, several of whom were ac- 
quaintances of Mrs. and Miss Tyrconnel. There was a 
murmur of conversation going on among the different 
groups, but in subdued tones that were almost lost in \ 
the vast space of the room. Mrs. Tyrconnel shivered 
a little as they sat down, and looked apprehensively at 
her daughter. “It is very cold,” she said. ”1 am 
afraid of this for you, Kathleen. I wish that I had not 
consented to your coming. I knew how it would be ; 
these immense rooms are cold always.” 

“I do not really think I shall take cold,” replied 
Kathleen. ” It is chilly, but I am warmly clad, and we 
may not have long to wait,” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


I9I 

Mrs. Tyrconnel shook her head. “ One always has 
to wait,” she said. 

The event amply justified this prediction.. For two 
hours they waited ; and as Cecil saw Kathleen growing 
whiter and whiter from cold and weariness, she began 
to share the apprehension of her mother. Yet the girl 
would not consent to go away and lose her audience. 
” What !” she said when this was proposed to her, 
” give up the blessing of the Holy Father because I 
may have a chill when I go home ! Non possumus, I 
am as firm on that point as the Vatican itself.” 

A courteous chamberlain came in once and explained 
the cause of delay. Before receiving them the Holy 
Father had to give an audience to an ambassador, and 
then to some great foreign prelates. ” How tired he 
will be before it comes to our turn !” said one of the 
ladies sympathetically. 

But presently, after prolonged and weary waiting, 
their turn came. The great doors were thrown open, 
and they were directed to pass into one of the beautiful 
Raphael loggias. What a picture met the eye as they 
did so ! Through the great windows sunlight was 
striking on the glorious frescoes, giving an effect of 
light and color beyond description ; and at the head of 
the gallery, surrounded by prelates and by the Noble 
Guard, stood a tall, slender figure clad in ivory 
white — Leo, Vicar of Christ and Father of Christen- 
dom. 

It was with a strange feeling that Cecil looked at this 
figure. She forgot all that she had ever said of her 
fear that the ideal she had formed of one so august 
would not be realized in seeing its realization before 
her eyes. Indeed she confessed to herself that she had 


192 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


never imagined a presence in which majesty and sweet- 
ness could be blended as they were blended here, with 
the highest spirituality of type and aspect. The body 
seemed no more than a frail, transparent shell for the 
soul which looked through it — that wonderful soul with 
its consuming ardor, its fervent piety, its far-reaching 
aims, and its intellectual power which is known to the 
whole world now, and has commanded the respect of 
even the worst enemies of the Papacy and of the 
Church. “It is impossible that any man could fulfil 
the ideal suggested by the claims the Roman Pontiff 
makes,” she had declared. Yet now she saw in this 
august presence all those claims embodied. The Vice-^ 
gerent of Christ stood before her clothed with a dignity 
beyond the dignity of kings, a tranquil and unapproach- 
able majesty which nothing could mar or disturb ; the 
Head of the Universal Church looked out from his 
prison palace with eyes so piercing and so clear — deep- 
set under a massive brow — that not one of the needs of 
the world, of its difficulties or its sufferings, escaped 
his glance ; while the Father of the Faithful — the de- 
scendant of him to whom was given the command, 

“ Feed My sheep” — welcomed his children with a sweet- 
ness so penetrating, a gentleness so touching, and an 
interest so personal, that the sense of awe was lost in 
affection. 

All of this Cecil was able to say to herself later, when, 
the audience over, she could define the impression 
which had been made upon her ; but when she ap- 
proached the benignant figure, when she caught the 
glance of the dark eyes and the smile of the gentle lips, ' 
she could only sink upon her knees, and touch her lips, 
with the first thrill of real homage that she had ever 1 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


193 


' felt, to the delicate hand — in tint like a piece of ivory 
carving — which was held out to her. 

, The rest was a dream to her. She knelt like one in 
1 a trance, absorbed in a rush of feeling which over- 
whelmed her, thinking of nothing save that here was 
the visible representative of God upon earth ; to this 
; hand which she had touched was committed the power 
; of the awful keys ; and through the lips that murmured 
a few words of kindest greeting, the Holy Ghost speaks 
to the Church of God. 

“ Have you no request to make to the Holy Father ?” 
asked a purple-robed monsignor, bending toward her. 

The words roused her a little. She threw back her 
head, looked up into the face above her, and suddenly 
the inmost need of her soul found expression. 

“O Holy Father,” she said, “give me faith! I 
wish to believe — I do believe — but something holds me 
back. Loose the spell — make me your child.” 

Had she been able to observe, she would have seen 
that the monsignor, and all of those near enough to 
hear what she said, looked surprised and a little startled 
at this unconventional outbreak. But she saw only, 
heeded only, the face of the Holy Father, which was 
full of interest, of sympathy, and of kindness, as it 
looked down upon her. 

” My child,” he said, in a voice of exquisite modula- 
tion, ‘‘faith is a gift of God. Have you asked it of 
Him ?” 

‘‘ Holy Father, yes — but it comes and goes — it does 
not stay with me.” 

‘‘ It will stay when you receive it in holy baptism. 
What you need is to act. So long as you are without 
the Church these temptations will assail you. Once 


194 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


within her shelter you will find peace. Go seek that 
shelter, and take my blessing with you.” 

It was as if an oracle had spoken, or indeed — for the 
comparison is poor — as if she had knelt at the feet of 
the Lord rather than of His Vicar, and said, ” What 
wilt Thou have me to do ?” She was answered, and she 
bent her head for the fatherly blessing with a rush of 
grateful tears. i 

j 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


195 


CHAPTER XX. 

‘ IF HE IS WISE HE WILL COME.’* 

“ A ND SO it was the Holy Father, and not my dear 
old Abbe, who converted you at last !” said 
Kathleen to Miss Lorimer a few days after the audience 
which would always be so memorable to the latter. 

“You forget that it was the Abbe who sent me to 
the Holy F'ather,” replied Cecil. “ But it is hardly 
possible to say that Ae converted me — he only told me 
what to do. In fact, no one converted me. That has 
been a process which has been going on for months, 
and which has been due to many influences. My stay 
in Paris did much for me, although Madame de Verac 
is of the world worldly to an extreme degree. But the 
first awakening impulse came before Paris. Looking 
back, I can see that now.” 

“ Sometimes those things go very far back — lie un- 
heeded, as it were, for years,” said Kathleen. “ I have 
known people who traced their conversion to some im- 
pression received in their childhood.” 

“ Mine is much more recent,” answered Cecil. She 
hesitated a moment, then added quickly : “ It may in- 
terest you to know that it dates from a few words of 
your brother’s. It was the night of the accident to the 
ship at sea. I had never thought of death, of God, of 
anything spiritual, except in the most vague and indiffer- 
ent manner. Some words that he said when the shock 


196 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


came — and they were very simple words — made me 
realize a different way of looking at these things. It 
was like an awakening. Afterward he let fall more 
than one remark which made me think. He seemed to 
have a standard by which to try things different from 
that of other men I had known. When I learned that 
he was a Catholic, I said to myself that I would find 
out more of what Catholics believed. And the end of 
the finding out is — I am a Catholic myself. That, I 
think, must always be the end.” 

There was a look of exalted pleasure on Kathleen’s 
face. ” And so Gerald helped you !” she said. ‘‘ How j 
glad I am, and how glad he will be to hear it ! Some 
of the chances of life — which, no doubt, we should not 
call chances — are wonderful, are they not ?” She leaned 
back on the cushions of the couch where she was lying 
— she had been ill ever since the day at the Vatican — 
and seemed to meditate for a moment. Then she add- 
ed : ‘‘I wish Gerald could come here. I think it would 
do him good.” 

” I am sure it would do you good,” observed Cecil. 

‘ I think you are fretting about him more than you 
allow any one to suppose.” 

” I hope I am not fretting,” the girl answered ; ” but 
I know he is in great trouble, and he has no one to help 
him. Not that he needs any one,” she added quickly, 

” farther than we all need sympathy and approval.” 

” Only the strongest souls can work without those 
things,” said Cecil thoughtfully. ‘‘It must be a sign 
of strength when the necessity to do so is laid upon any 
one.” 

Kathleen sighed a little, but then smiled with the 
radiance of a sudden recollection. ‘‘And so it was 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


197 


Gerald who set you on your journey !” she said. “ I 
am SO glad ! But when will it end ? — when are you to 
be received into the Church ?” 

“ As soon as the Abbe Ravoux thinks I am sufficiently 
instructed. He found me very ignorant of many things 
—of almost everything, I may say. And he makes in- 
struction so delightful — there is something so wonder- 
fully beautiful in the harmony, the coherence of every 
part, the luminous splendor of the Church as he shows 
it — that I am not impatient for this time of probation 
to end, except indeed that I may return to the Holy 
Father, as he bade me.” 

” There is One greater than the Holy Father, who is 
awaiting you at the end,” said Kathleen softly. ” But 
it is natural, I suppose, that you should not realize that 
yet.” 

Cecil flushed a little. ” I think that I realize it,” 
she answered ; ” but you are right to remind me.” 

” One question more, if you will not regard me as 
impertinent,” said Kathleen. ” What do your friends 
think of your course ?” 

Miss Lorimer unconsciously lifted her head with one 
of her old gestures of haughtiness. ” I have not asked 
them what they think,” she replied. ” I have simply 
announced what I am about to do. But I know” — and 
a look of amusement came into her eyes — ” what my 
sister and brother-in-law at home will think. They 
have always expected me to do something foolish and 
visionary — they will say now that I have done it.” 

” You are the last person in the world I would expect 
to do anything foolish or visionary,” said Kathleen, 
with surprise. ” Why should they imagine it of you ?” 

“Ah, why? That question involves a great deal. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


198 

Perhaps because they know me best, perhaps because 
they know me least, as is often the case with people 
who are nearest to one. At all events, they certainly 
believe me capable du tout." 

They both laughed, and then Cecil rose from her 
seat by the side of the couch. “ I must go now,” she 
said. ” My hour with the Abbe is at hand, and after 
that I have one or two social engagements. By the by, 
Lionel Erie is tormenting me as to when you are com- 
ing with us to his studio. I hope that you will soon be 
well enough to gratify him.” 

” I hope so too,” was the languid reply ; ” but this 
cold has taken such a deep hold upon me that I cannot 
tell. Give my love to the Abbe, and ask him to come 
and see me.” 

When the Abbe came he was quite startled by the 
girl’s pallor and weakness. ” Why, this will never do,” 
he said, ” as a result of a visit to the Vatican ! I am 
shocked at you. Has the Holy Father’s blessing no 
more effect ?” 

” Every effect spiritually,” answered Kathleen, smil- 
ing. ” His cold palace has also a strong bodily effect. 
But I do not mind the illness, I am so glad that I went. 
If I had not gone Miss Lorimer might not have gone 
either, and the result with her is all that is to be de- 
sired.” 

” Yes,” answered the Abbe ; “I should say that she 
was very impressionable if I did not perceive that her 
visit to the Vatican was only the culmination of a long 
series of impressions and convictions. She has a very 
striking character. I believe that she is intended to do 
some great woi*k in the world.” 

” She sometimes speaks as if that was her hope. I 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE, 


199 


I 

. have often wondered what is in her mind, but I did not 
. like to ask.” 

” I do not think she knows herself, as yet. My own 
‘impression is that she possesses great wealth, which 
[ she wishes to employ wisely. She has never told me 
this, but I judge so from some remarks that she has let 
(fall.” 

I “I should not be surprised if your conjecture is cor- 
|rect,” said Miss Tyrconnel, after a moment’s pause. 

1 ” I have heard her speak more than once of the great 
i responsibility of wealth, and of the difficulty of finding 
j a worthy use for it ; but she said nothing of herself in 
j connection with the subject.” 

I The Abbe nodded. ” She would not be likely to men- 
tion herself in the matter,” he said. ” There is some- 
thing very unusual about her ; she is very reticent, 
although so frank and direct. Altogether an interest- 
ing person.” 

“Gerald found her so,” observed Miss Tyrconnel 
musingly. “ He spoke of her to me, but I am sure 
now that he must have thought much more than he 
said.” 

The priest smiled. “ Do not weave a romance before 
you are certain of your matei ial, ’ ’ he answered, ‘ ‘ though 
I grant that Miss Lorimer is fitted to be the heroine of 
one.” 

Miss Lorimer’s friends, meanwhile, were more con- 
cerned than they ventured to express to her, by the 
resolution she had communicated to them of becoming 
a Catholic. Mrs. Severn uttered her concern to Craven. 

“Of course,” she remarked, “it is no business of 
mine to remonstrate with Miss Lorimer, but I really 
think that some one ought to hold her back. She is 


200 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


being carried away by a fit of enthusiasm which she will ■ 
certainly regret.” | 

” I am afraid that I cannot altogether agree with | 
you,” replied that gentleman. ” Miss Lorimer has a | 
deceptive character. Enthusiasm does not carry her i 
away nearly so much as appearances would seem to 
indicate. I have seen her tested sufficiently to be sure 
of that. This step which she is about to take is the 
result, I think, of long feeling, if not of long thought. 

When I saw her in France last summer I could tell that : 

1 

the tide was setting that way with her. And I do not 
need the assurances of her relatives at home to believe 
that, her mind once made up, she has an indomitable 
will. No one could hold her back.” 

“It is a great pity,” said the woman of the 
world. 

” Why a great pity ?” the man of the world asked, 
smiling. ” If there is anything in religion at all — you 
will pardon the if — the great Roman Church possesses! 
such unquestioned superiority over all other forms of 
it that I cannot conceive hesitation between them. It ' 
offers a logical reason for being, which satisfies the 
mind ; a devotion which satisfies the heart ; and a 
majesty of history, a splendor and poetry of ritual, 
which satisfy the taste. Honestly, I do not wonder at 
Miss Lorimer’s step at all.” 

Mrs. Severn opened her eyes a little. ” One might 
think you on the brink of such a step yourself,” she 
said. ” But do you know what an important person 
she is ?” 

” I know that she has a good deal of money, if that 
is what you mean. And the fact renders her relatives j 
uneasy concerning her. They do not know what she | 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


201 


will do with it, but I would be willing to wager that in 
the end she will apply it to some noble purpose.” 

” I am afraid that her ideas are very visionary and 
Quixotic.” 

” Probably they are, but that is better than never to 
have any visions at all ; for out of the visions may come 
realities of which the world is much in need. Miss 
Lorimer has not acted rashly on her visions ; she has 
had humility enough to wait for guidance.” 

” She has found it now,” said Mrs. Severn, with faint 
sarcasm. 

“Yes,” answered Craven, “I think she has; and I 
for one am honestly glad of it.” 

He expressed much the same sentiments a little later 
to Miss Marriott, who also declared her surprise, if not 
concern, at Cecil’s resolution. 

“It is so unlike her !” she said. ” Of all people 
whom I have ever known, Cecil Lorimer is the most 
proudly self-sustained. Her own will has been the 
guide and rule of her conduct always. That she should 
surrender it now, and submit to be told what she is to 
believe and what she is to do ! — that is wonderful. 
After this I shall never think that I know any one.” 

“It is difficult to know any one so well that he or 
she cannot surprise us,” said Craven. “ But I do not 
think Miss Lorimer’s self-will was of the vulgar kind 
which cannot endure any surrender. If I understand 
her at all, she followed her will because it was the best 
standard she had, but she was not averse to submit to 
a better authority if she found it ; and she believes that 
she has found it now.” 

“Yes, she believes it,” said Grace; “but will the 
belief last ? She is borne away now on a tide of ad- 


202 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


miration for all that she sees around her here ; but 
when the issue comes — as it will come sooner or later — 
between her own will and the authority to which she 
has submitted, / believe she will follow her own will.” 

” And I do not,” said Craven. ” I believe that she 
will be thorough in whatever she undertakes.” 

It was at this moment that the door opened quickly, 
and into the room where they were sitting Miss Lorimer 
entered. She looked pale and agitated as she advanced 
with an open note in her hand. 

” Grace,” she said, ” here is very bad news from 
Miss Tyrconnel. Her mother writes me that she is 
very ill — dangerously ill, I fear. I am going at once to 
see if I can be of any use. Oh ! how do you do, Mr. 
Craven ? I beg pardon for overlooking you, but I am 
very much concerned by this intelligence.” 

” So am I,” said Grace ; ” and she is such a frail 
creature that one must fear the worst. Shall I come 
with you ?” 

” No, I think not. There may be no need of me, 
but at least I must go and see for myself what the dan- 
ger is. Mrs. Severn is not in. Tell her when she re- 
turns where I have gone. If they let me, I may remain. 
Good-by.” 

She went out as hastily as she had entered, and when 
Craven returned after accompanying her to the waiting 
carriage, he found Miss Marriott sitting so absorbed in 
revery that she started when he entered. 

” A penny for your thoughts,” he said, sitting doAvn 
and looking at her, smiling. 

She smiled in return, her pretty brown eyes shining 
in the firelight — for it was growing dusky in the great 
salon. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


203 


“ I was thinking,” she said, ” that the accidents of 
I life have sometimes a singular air of having been 
planned for us. It was such a mere accident our meet- 
; ing Miss Tyrconnel, and Cecil has taken such a fancy 
to her.” 

“Yes?” said Craven, as he paused. He knew that 
there was something else to come. 

” I hope she is not really very ill,” pursued Miss 
Marriott ; ” but if she is, I suppose they will send for 
her brother. ” 

” Oh !” said Craven. It was a prolonged and sig- 
nificant sound. ” I never heard of the brother before” 

1 1 — drawing his chair a little closer. “Tell me about 
him.” 

, ‘ Grace laughed. ” There really is not much to tell,” 

I jshe replied. “We met him on the steamer coming 
i lover. He was very interesting, a fine type of gentle- 
man — intellectual, cultivated, reserved about himself, 
and with an air of unaffected melancholy which always 
touches women, you know.” 

“ And he knew also, very likely.” 

“ No ! Do I not tell you it was unaffected ? Since 
.meeting his sister we have learned the cause. He had 
[inherited an Irish estate, and was going back to it — ” 
j “ Cause enough in that for melancholy, I grant. 

I Probably he was afraid of being shot.” 

Ij “He was afraid,” continued Grace, with an air 
I iwhich reproved this interruption, “ of the responsibility 
I jthat lay before him, and the absolute necessity of giv- 
|ing pain to those who uphold the old r^gime^ especially 
to his mother. It was one of the old rack-rented estates. 
The landlord — Mr. Tyrconnel’s uncle — had no inter- 
! course with his people except through his agent, and 


204 


A WOMAN OP FORTUNE. 


the bitterness between them had, of course, been grow- 
ing steadily worse during the last few years. Gerald, | 
as his sister calls him, had left home because his remon- 
strances were unheeded, and he could not look on at 
the mismanagement and the suffering he had no power, 
to prevent. His uncle would have alienated the estate ; 
from him if he could, but it was entailed. So it fell to' 
him, and when we met him he was on his way to enter i 
into possession and face the difficulties before him. , 
They were very great. The estate was encumbered so 
that he had little money at his command ; his mother^- 
violently opposed his measures — indeed she has abso-| 
lutely quarrelled with him on the subject ; the peoplej, 
oppressed and poverty-stricken, were sullen and hardf. 
to be convinced of his good intentions. Altogether, . 
the poor fellow has lain on anything but a bed of roses- 
since we parted with him at Queenstown ; but, from 
his sister’s account, he has faced it like a hero.” 

” What a delightful thing it is,” said Craven, medi 
tatively, “ to have a woman for an advocate ! Happy 
Tyrconnel ! I would be willing to face even the diffi 
culties and perils that beset an Irish landlord to have 
my prowess recounted as you have recounted his.” 

” I should be very glad, Mr. Craven, if you would be"" 
kind enough not to laugh at me,” remarked Grace, 
with much severity. ” It seems to me that any one 
who knew the case would speak of Mr. Tyrconnel just 
as I have spoken.” 

” Well, I fancy he has not been very comfortable,” 
said Craven ; ” but fate is apparently about to do him'' 
a good turn. Miss Lordmer shares your interest in 
him, I presurne ?” 

” She liked him very much, but I suppose you hav^ 


f 

I 

A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 205 

: discovered by this time that Cecil is not very impres- 
j sionable where men are concerned. I cannot say that 
t she liked him more than as an interesting acquaintance 
j who made our voyage very pleasant to us.” 

\ ” If he is wise he will come to see his sister,” said 

j Craven. ” He may fail, as other men have failed before 
i him ; but he will never find a fortune better worth win- 
1 ning than Miss Lorimer’s heart.” 

‘‘It is such a great heart that I do not know the man 
i who is worthy to fill it,” said Grace. 

‘‘ Neither do I,” Craven assented ; ‘‘ yet it is better 
I for its own sake that it should be filled even by one 
1 who may not be altogether worthy of it. And, seri- 
|ously, I have some hopes of your Irishman.”, 

I ‘‘ Not mine^'' said Grace, laughing. ‘‘ Whatever 
j Cecil thought of him, it was evident to the most super- 
j ficial observation what he thought of her.” 

! ‘‘I did not imagine he was really yours,” said Craven. 

” You praised him too frankly. And perhaps you will 
pardon me for saying that I was glad to hear it.” 

Probably Grace was not sorry that Mrs. Severn’s en- 
trance at this moment prevented the necessity of an- 
swering that remark. 


2o6 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXL 

“l AM GERALD TYRCONNEL.” 

M ISS MARRIOTT proved a true prophet. The 
news of his sister’s serious illness brought Ger- 
ald Tyrconnel to Rome as fast as steam could carry 
him. There had always subsisted a very tender affec- 
tion between the brother and sister ; and, knowing her, 
delicate constitution, he did not wait to be told that] 
she was in danger, but, without a moment’s delay in > 
starting, hastened at once to her bedside. 

He entered Rome after nightfall, and drove directly 
to his mother’s lodgings. The dark old palace seemed' 
full of gloom as he entered under the vast, echoing 
arch, and asked the porter who emerged for Mrs. Tyr- 
connel’s apartment. He dared not inquire how Kath- 
leen was, but his heart was beating painfully with a 
sense of foreboding as he climbed the stone staircase^ 
and finally rang the bell of the door indicated. 

It was opened by hie mother’s maid, who greeted 
him with a welcome such as only an Irish servant can 
utter. 

“ O Mr. Gerald ! but it’s glad I am to see you !” 
she cried. “ And Miss Kathleen will be happy ! Don’t ^ 
I see how she’s fretting for you all the time !” i 

“ How is she, Mary ?” he asked, reassured somewhat 
by the last words. 

“Thank God, she’s better,’’ Mary answered ; “but 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


207 


j 

I she’s been very bad, and it’s hard work the mistress 
and Miss Cecil and I have had to bring her through. 

; The doctor says good nursing done it, and it’s true for 
! him. She’s had the best of it, sure.” 

” Miss Cecil !” repeated Tyrconnel, wondering if he 
heard aright. 

” Sure that’s Miss Lorimer,” said Mary. ” She’s 
: been here nearly all the time, and an angel of a young 
lady she is. She’s got a way wid her that takes the 

: heart out of your breast. But come in here, Mr. Ger- 

I aid, while I go and tell the mistress you’ve come.” 

She opened a door, and Gerald passed into a large, 

I dim room, where at first he could see nothing but the 
Ij glow of the fire at what seemed a remote distance. 

I But he had not advanced more than half-way down the 

f length of the apartment, when a figure rose from the 

i depths of a large chair and came to meet him. 

” Your patient is much better, doctor,” said a voice 
which sent a thrill through him with its remembered 
tones. ” I left her sleeping, and have been very near 
sleeping myself here in the dark.” 

The speaker was a good deal surprised when the sup- 
posed doctor held out his hand. 

I am very grateful to hear that she is better,” was 
the reply of a voice that she too remembered. ” But 
instead of being the doctor I am Gerald Tyrconnel. 
You, I think, are Miss Lorimer, and I am glad that my 
first words to you are words of thanks for your kindness 
to my sister.” 

” O Mr. Tyrconnel !” said Cecil. ” The want of 
light must excuse my mistake. I am very glad you 
have come, for I am sure that your presence will be 
Kathleen’s best medicine. And I am glad also that you 


2o8 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


have come just when we have good news for you. Yes, 
your sister is much better.” 

“Thank God!” said Tyrconnel. “I am infinitely j 
relieved to hear it ; for I have feared— everything. She ; 
is very fragile, as you have no doubt perceived.” 

“Yes; for a few days the doctors — we all — were 
very apprehensive. But to-day I can perceive that she 
is improving. I fear, however, that you cannot hope ; 
to see her to-night ; it would excite her too much.” 

“ I am very willing to wait. It is enough to know 
that she is better.” i 

“ Meanwhile has Mrs. Tyrconnel heard that you are 
here ? I think she is with Kathleen. I will send her to 
you and take her place.” 

She turned to go, anxious to avoid the meeting be- 
tween mother and son, and Tyrconnel made no effort to 
detain her. But as he moved across the floor to open 
the door for her, he said, in a voice full of feeling : ] 

“ I cannot say how happy I am to renew the ac- 
quaintance which made my last voyage across the Atlan- j 
tic such a bright memory in my life ; nor can I tell you , 
how grateful I am for your goodness to my sister. 
Words are very poor in expressing such obligations.” 

“ There are no obligations involved,” returned Cecil 
quickly. “ I owe your sister a great deal — when she is 
better she will tell you in what way — and I have become 
warmly attached to her. I am here, therefore, because = 
it is a pleasure to me to be with her. No thanks are 
due to me ; on the contrary, I have to thank your mother . 
for allowing me to help her.” i 

With a bend of her head, and a smile which even the 
dim light revealed full of sweetness, she passed him 
and was gone. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


209 


Tyrconnel walked slowly back the length of the apart- 
ment to the fire, and there he stood, looking at the 
chair from which Cecil had risen, and so lost in thought 
that he did not heed the entrance of a servant with 
lights, until his mother followed a few minutes later. 

Her welcome was more cordial than he had ventured 
to expect. In truth, she had been so wretched over 
one child that her heart was unconsciously softened 
toward the other, and she could not but be glad that 
Kathleen should have the great happiness of seeing her 
brother. She described the girl’s illness minutely, 
dwelt upon its symptoms, told what the doctors said, 
and finally spoke of Cecil. 

“ I hardly know what I should have done without 
Miss Lorimer,” she said. “At first I was averse to 
letting her assist me in nursing Kathleen, but she 
seemed so anxious that I finally yielded, and she has 
proved a treasure — -so capable, so prompt, so devoted. 
I have never felt more grateful to any one than I do to 
her ; for she has really sustained me during this terrible 
time of anxiety.” 

“ Why did you not summon me at once ?” asked Tyr- 
connel. “ I should not be here now if I had not feared 
what illness with Kathleen must mean.” 

“ It did not seem necessary ; the doctors said all 
along that there was no danger, but I knew that they 
were anxious.” 

“ And she is positively better ?” 

“ Very much better, but I dare not let her know to- 
night that you are here. It would excite her too much. 
Are you ill yourself ?” she asked, in a tone of concern, 

as it struck her how pale he was. ” You really look 
} } 


so. 


210 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ Oh, I am quite well,” he answered ; ” but of course 
I have been very anxious, and have had a hurried and 
fatiguing journey. I shall sleep well to-night.” 

He did sleep well, but in his dreams he found himself 
again and again advancing down a long room — once it : 
seemed one of the vast galleries of the Vatican — to i 
meet Cecil Lorimer, who came toward him with out- ! 
stretched hand. Just before awaking he dreamed of 
her as he had seen her last on the deck of the steamer, 
when he had said to himself with sadness of heart that 
he should never see her again — and woke with a thrill 
to hear the bells of Rome ringing the Angelas. 

He rose at once, and having, like most Irishmen who 
are worthy of the name, a deep strain of religious feel- 
ing in his nature, he went out to find a church in which 
to return thanks for the good news that had greeted him j 
at the end of his journey, and to render to God that act 
of homage which, due everywhere, seems specially due |j 
in the Eternal City of His Vicar. “ 

There is not any part of Rome where one need go far ; 
to find a church. Tyrconnel found the ever-open portal j 
very near at hand, and entering, passed down the dim 
nave until he found a Mass in progress in one of the ' 

chapels. About twenty persons were gathered before | 

the altar, and as he knelt just within the gates his eye | 

was attracted by the figure of a lady kneeling in front i 

of him. It hardly required the grace of her form and , 

bearing to tell him it was Cecil Lorimer. Instinct | 

told him that at once, and his surprise was great to i 

perceive that she seemed to be a Catholic. He was 
very certain that when they were on the ship together 
she had not been a Catholic, and he watched her now 
with a wonder which amounted to a distraction, per- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


2TI 


ceiving that not one of the Roman group around was 
more devout in manner than herself. “ She musfhQ a 
Catholic ; and yet, if so, it is strange Kathleen should 
never have mentioned it,” he thought ; not knowing 
that after their visit to the Vatican Kathleen had been 
too ill to write to him. 

After the Mass was over he waited and met Cecil — 
very much to her surprise — at the door of the church. 
” I hope that I need not introduce myself again by day- 
light,” he said, as he advanced toward her. ” But I 
could not blame you if it were necessary, for we scarcely 
saw each other last night.” 

” I should blame myself, however, if it were neces- 
sary,” replied Cecil, with a smile. ” Do you think I 
have forgotten all our days of pleasant companionship 
on the ship ? I told you then that we should meet 
again some day. I think, if I remember right, that it 
was you who doubted it.” 

” I had forgotten for the time that all roads lead to 
Rome,” he said. “Yet even in Rome there are differ- 
ent paths, and I am very happy that yours and my 
sister’s chanced to meet.” 

“ It has been a great pleasure — I may say a great 
privilege — to me to know her,” Miss Lorimer answered. 
“ It is in great measure owing to my acquaintance with 
her that I have found the road which leads to the true 
Rome — the City of St. Peter.” 

Involuntarily Tyrconnel held out his hand with a 
warm gesture of congratulation. 

“ I thought you must be a Catholic when I saw you 
in the church,” he said. “ And yet it seemed almost 
incredible, for you certainly were not one when we 
parted.” 


212 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


She shook her head. “ Certainly I was not,” she an- 
swered. ” If you remember the night of the collision 
with the iceberg, you must also remember that I was ; 
far more of a heathen than anything else. But I think 
I was rather a high-minded heathen. That is all which 
could be said for m^. I believed in justice and honor 
and truth and other noble abstractions, but I knew as 
little as possible of God, from whom they derive their ^ 
meaning.” 

” I do not remember that you impressed me at all as ■ 
a heathen,” said Tyrconnel, smiling ; ” but I remember ! 
exceedingly well the doctrine that you preached of the 
possibility of accomplishing anything by will and effort. ! 
I thought it rather impracticable — the views, if you will ' 
excuse me, of one who had no experience of the diffi- 
culties of life. But since then, in my moments of dark- ; 
est discouragement, your words have recurred to me 
and strengthened my resolution. I have fancied once ' 
or twice that you might like to know this ; for 1 think 
I perceived in you a very strong desire to benefit your 
fellow-creatures.” . I 

She looked at him with a glow in her eyes — the glow | 
which springs from deeply touched feeling. ” I like 
very much to know it,” she said, “especially since I ’ 
have heard what difficulties you are struggling with. 1 
never fancied that any words of mine could help a man 
in such a struggle — for you are right in thinking that 
I have little practical experience of the difficulties of 
life — but I am more than glad if they have done so, 

I am grateful.” 

“ Nay, it is I who should be — who am — grateful,” he 
said. “ Kathleen has told you, I see, something of 
what I have been trying to do, so you may imagine 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


213 


how much I have needed encouragement — but what an 
egotist I am to be talking of myself, without asking if 
you have seen her this morning ! I presume that you 
remained with my mother last night ?” 

“ Yes, and I went to Kathleen’s bedside just before 
I came out. She was sleeping so calmly and sweetly 
that I have finally laid aside all fear. And I am glad 
to think what a happiness is before her when she knows 
that you are here.” They had reached the archway of 
the old palace, and there she paused. ” I will bid you 
good-morning here,” she said. ” While it is still early 
— no fashionable people about to be shocked — I shall 
go home.” 

” You do not mean that you will walk ?” 

” I think so — I am fond of walking — but if I grow 
tired I can take a carriage on the way. Tell Kathleen 
that I will see her soon again ; and when you are at 
leisure, Mr. Tyrconnel, I shall be happy to you." 

” But this will never do,” he said. ” If you will not 
allow me to accompany you — ” 

She shook her head, smiling. ” That would not an- 
swer at all,” she replied. 

” Then you must let me call a carriage for you. I 
am not very well versed in social customs, but I hardly 
think it is the thing for you to walk across Rome un- 
attended. Come in, and I will send the cojicierge — what 
do they call him in Italian ? — for a carriage, if you will 
not return to my mother’s apartment and take break- 
fast with us.” 

“No,” she said; “I really must go home now. 
When I went into the church I meant it only for a stop- 
ping-place on my journey. I am sometimes unconven- 
tional when I can safely be so, and I enjoyed the 


214 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


thought of walking across Rome alone in the early | 
morning.” 

“ I am sorry to interfere with anything which you j 
would enjoy, but I really think my plan is best.” ] 

” I suppose it is,” she answered, with a little sigh, as j 
she entered the court. ” Send for the carriage, please. ” 
The carriage was sent for — could not of course be 
found at once, and Tyrconnel had a few more minutes 
of conversation in the shadow of the dark old archway. 
Then a cab drove up ; he placed Cecil in it, and after 
it drove away bounded as lightly as a boy up the stairs 
to his mother’s apartment. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


215 


CHAPTER XXII. 

“ WITH EMPTY HANDS.” 

T he days that followed Tyrconnel’s arrival in Rome 
were very pleasant. His presence helped Kath- 
leen to recover rapidly ; and, first around her convales- 
cent couch, afterward in excursions and drives on sunny 
days to various points about Rome, some delightful 
hours were spent by a party that combined many agree- 
able elements. Beside the Tyrconnels and Miss Lori- 
mer, Grace Marriott and Craven, Mrs. Severn and 
Lionel Erie made up a group of altogether sympathetic 
quality ; and, according to the usual habit of people in 
a place where there is nothing to do but meet, hardly 
a day passed without bringing them together in one 
way or another. There is so much to see and do in 
Rome — galleries, ruins, churches, villas, to visit ; the 
Pincian to lounge upon and review all the world, hos- 
pitable salons in which to meet — he must be dull indeed 
who does not find the charm of the Eternal City grow 
upon him day by day. 

It was an old charm to Gerald Tyrconnel ; but now 
there was a fresh one interwoven with it, which deep- 
ened constantly. He scarcely dared give it a name to 
himself ; and yet he knew that if it had cost him a 
struggle to pait with Cecil Lorimer when he had known 
her before, the struggle would be tenfold greater now. 
But he did not think of parting, in these sunny, charm- 


2i6 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


ing hours of delightful companionship. The present 
sufficed him. He shook off the 'memory of the sad, 
dark days he had left in Ireland — of the difficulties 
there to which he must return — and gladdened Kath- 
leen’s heart by his cheerfulness of manner and bearing. 
Only now and then a cloud seemed to fall upon him, 
and it chanced that one of these moments of despon- 
dency brought forth a confidence to Cecil which inter- 
ested and touched her. 

They were standing together on the platform in front 
of San Pietro in Montorio, where they had gone by 
Kathleen’s request ; and the tombs in the church of 
“ sad Ulster’s princes”* had so affected Tyrconnel that 
the shadow was still resting over him when Cecil and 
he came out into the sunshine to admire the wonderful 
view of the city which this terrace commands. It was 
a scene which usually would have wakened in him a J 
quick response of delight and admiration, for all an- 
cient and modern Rome lies spread before the gaze. j 
But now he looked at it with almost unheeding eyes ; 
for his mental glance was fixed on that beautiful Isle of 
Sorrow across the seas, where such woe has reigned 
for centuries. 

” Looking over the earth, looking over history, where 
can one find anything to equal her in the greatness and 
duration of her sorrows?” he said. ‘‘She is the 
martyr among nations, on whom God has laid His 
severest trials, as if to prove the majesty and constancy 
of her faith.” 

‘‘ And in proving it she has been made such a specta- 
cle for the edification of mankind,” said Cecil, ‘‘ that it 


Tyrconnel and Tyrone. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


217 


seems to me one can hardly regret the suffering which 
has called forth such heroic virtue.” 

” If it were all heroic virtue !” he remarked. ” But 
that is too much to expect. There is a human side 
that saddens one because it is made up of desperation 
and crime. Great wrongs madden at last, and great 
suffering leads to despair if it does not lead to sanctity. 
Collectively, the people of Ireland have for centuries 
shown the spirit of saints ; but always there has been 
an element in which the usual fruit of oppression is 
seen in desperate deeds, and that element has increased 
of late. The long-suffering people have now to endure, 
besides the tyranny of their oppressors, the worse 
tyranny — worse because encompassing their lives more 
closely — of the secret societies banded together for 
crime.” 

” It must be terrible !” said Cecil, in a tone of deep- 
est sympathy. 

” It w terrible,” he answered. ” And here is where 
I find my efforts most baffled. The men who compose 
these societies, and especially those who lead them, are 
entirely revolutionary and socialistic in spirit. They 
do not desire that any good feeling should be estab- 
lished between landlord and tenant. The bitterness 
that exists — the hatred which the very name of land- 
lord produces in the Irish peasant’s breast — serves their 
ends exactly. And so a good landlord is more abhor- 
rent in their eyes than a bad one. The people — our 
long-suffering, true-hearted Catholic people — are not 
with them, but they are terrorized by them. Brave as 
they are by nature, they are not brave enough to defy 
these midnight murderers. Considering the deeds of 
blood so constantly perpetrated, it is too much to ex- 


2i8 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


pect that they should not be intimidated. And so, as 
I have said, at every turn I find my efforts baffled.” 

” Do they interfere between you and your tenants ?” 
asked Cecil. 

” Constantly,” he answered, ” I have received many 
threatening letters warning me that if I did not do cer- 
tain things, or leave certain other things undone, I 
should draw down on my head the vengeance of this 
secret power. I never paid the slightest attention to 
such warnings. But it is a very different matter with 
the people. When a man is told that he shall not take 
a holding because another disaffected and thoroughly 
bad tenant has been obliged to give it up, he simply 
dare not touch it. If he is told that he must withhold 
the rent, he dare not pay it. So that our unhappy land 
seems given over to hopeless misery, and one’s attempts , 
to do good are frustrated in all directions.” I 

” But you should not lose courage,” said Cecil. 

” Oh, you should keep a strong heart, for such a battle 
is worth fighting and winning ! To lift people from a 
slough of misery, to make their lives better, to relieve 
them from a burden of despair, to show them the way 
to comfort, and help them to walk in it — surely there 
could not be a work in this world better worth doing, j 
nor one more pleasing to God.” 

“You are right,” replied Tyrconnel, catching some- 
what the glow of her enthusiasm, but with the sadness 
which had overmastered him still evident in look and 
tone. “Those are the things I have said to myself, 
that I say to myself still ; but I have learned that to do 
them is all but impossible. When we crossed the ocean 
together I knew that I was going to a hard task, but I 
did not know half how hard it would prove. I was 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


219 


aware that I should have to reckon with the bitter op- 
position of my mother when I attempted any change in 
the management of the estate — perhaps Kathleen has 
told you that it had been horribly mismanaged for 
many years ?” 

“ Yes, she told me that there were many abuses 
and oppressions which you have endeavored to abol- 
ish.” 

“ I can give you no idea of their extent. It was, like 
numberless other estates in Ireland, rack-rented to the 
last degree, impoverished, with nothing spent on the 
land and everything taken out of it ; cottages in ruins, 
the tenants hopeless, broken-spirited — a picture of 
wretchedness and the abuse of power. I expected, as 
I said, opposition from my mother when I attempted to 
change all this ; but I did not expect to find the people 
so sullen, and the secret societies so antagonistic to me. 
Between all these, and with hands tied by the lack of 
that potent factor called money, I confess to you that 
my heart and my courage alike have nearly failed.” 

There was something so touching to Cecil in these 
last words — they were so evidently wrung from the 
speaker, so simply, so unconsciously said — that she 
would have liked to put out her hand and touch his in 
token of sympathy. But that being impossible, she said 
in a voice of great feeling : 

“lam glad that you say ‘ nearly ’ failed only, for you 
must not let them fail. It is such a great thing in this 
world of selfishness to try, even, to do something alto- 
gether worth doing. Though you cannot at once see 
the fruits of your efforts, it is a great privilege to be 
allowed to make them Don’t lose courage, then, even 
if the fight is hard. When you mean only good to your 


: 22 <:) 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


people, it cannot be but that you will win their con- 
fidence at last.” 

” I endeavor to reassure myself with that reflection,” 
he answered ; ” but, you see, I have so little power to 
do what 1 desire for their benefit. Even if the rents 
were not withheld — as they are in several cases, one or 
two of which will give me a great deal of trouble, I fear 
— I cannot press a people so desperately poor. I have 
voluntarily lowered the rent of almost every tenant, so 
that my income is much diminished, and out of this 
income I have to pay heavy debts. This leaves abso- 
lutely no margin for the improvements I have wished 
to make in the estate — the improvements that musf be 
made if it is ever to become such an estate as a Chris- 
tian man can in conscience possess.” 

“Then money could help you?” said Cecil. “It 
could strengthen your hands and aid you to accomplish 
your ends ?” 

He laughed slightly. ” What is there in this world,” 
he asked, ” in which money cannot help ? God, no 
doubt, can work without it when He wills to do so ; but 
usually He works by human means, of which it is one 
of the most powerful. Yes, money could do much for 
me. It would build habitations fit for men and women 
to live in, and establish industries that would enable a 
starving people to earn their bread at home instead of 
being driven to cross the seas for it ; it would make 
what is now a wilderness blossom like the rose — ah, do 
not lead me to say all that it could do ; for I should 
weary you, my day-dreams are so many! From my 
early boyhood I brooded over these things ; I saw the 
suffering, the desperate, hopeless poverty of the people 
ever before my eyes ; I saw them driven forth in sorrow 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


221 


and sadness as exiles fiom the land which they love 
with passionate devotion ; and I said to myself that 
some day I would see if one man at least could not 
change things for the better. I dreamed of providing 
employment for all who wanted it, of well-cultivated 
lands and comfortable cottages, and discontent banished 
from one corner of the land. And then I dreamed of 
the money which would be required to bring about 
this change. ‘ I will go to the other side of the world 
and make it,’ I said to myself, ‘ so that I may be ready 
when the opportunity comes.’ I went, but the oppor- 
tunity came sooner than I expected, before the fortune 
was made ; and I returned as I had gone — with empty 
hands. ” 

His voice sank a little over the last words, as if he 
realized afresh the depressing fact of their emptiness ; 
and Cecil’s heart gave a sudden throb of self-reproach 
as she remembered how she had once said of him, 
lightly and carelessly, “It seems a very pitiful thing 
to do — to give one’s best years just to accumulate 
money.’’ And this was the reason for which he desired 
to accumulate it — that he might lessen the misery of 
his people, and do such good as she had only vaguely 
pondered. She felt as if she must beg his pardon for 
that past rash judgment — this man who was doing with 
empty hands more than her full ones had ever accom- 
plished ! But before she could frame words to express 
her rush of feeling, Kathleen came out of the church 
and joined them. 

“ Oh, what a scene !” she cried, with a deep, soft 
sigh of delight, as she leaned against the parapet by 
Cecil’s side and looked out over the picture which lay 
before them— the circling heights of ancient Rome 


222 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


crowned with ruins, palaces, and churches ; the Campus 
Martius covered with the roofs and towers of the medise- 
val city ; the Castle of San Angelo overlooking the 
Tiber ; and the vast mass of the Vatican rising above 
the crowded houses of the Borgo ; while the rounded, 
wonderful outlines of St. Peter’s dome stood out against 
the soft blue background of the distant hills. 

“ St. Peter had his See at his feet when he came here 
to die,” said Tyrconnel. ” It must have been a mar- 
vellous sight upon that day, and more marvellous still 
to the eye of faith piercing the future. Was a vision 
vouchsafed him of the glory of that future — of the cen- 
turies in which his successors should rule with unques- 
tioned sway over all the kingdoms and nations of the 
earth, of the light pouring forth from this centre over 
the whole world, of the shrine and refuge that it should 
prove to the oppressed of all lands ? Truly, if so, he 
might have said a Nunc dimittis." 

” Whether the vision was vouchsafed him or not, 
I am sure he said it,” replied Cecil. ” That impetuous, 
vehement, loving heart was not likely to count pain or 
death when it was a question of rejoining his Master by 
his Master’s own road. Yes, it must have been with a 
joyous heart that he stood here and looked out over the 
imperial city, which was to be the seat of his power 
unto the end of time — even if he did not foresee all that 
we know.” 

” ‘ History is mad or finds its meaning here,’ ” quoted 
Tyrconnel, looking toward that majestic dome which 
rises above the tomb of him who suffered an ignominious 
death on the height of Janiculum. ” Some phases of 
human thought I can understand, but what I cannot 
understand is how any mind capable of reading or un- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


223 


derstanding history can be blind to the part which the 
See of Peter has played in it— can fail to see the super- 
natural element thus introduced into human affairs, and 
which cannot be explained on any human ground what- 
ever. He who reigns in the Vatican yonder, whom not 
even an infidel and usurping power dares to touch, has 
no more material strength than the poor Jewish prisoner 
dying here. And, with few exceptions, this has been 
the case with the long line of Pontiffs — a fact to which 
history offers no parallel. And yet there are people for 
whom this has no meaning.” 

” And I was one of them only yesterday,” said Cecil, 
with a touch of humility in her voice. 

“No,” said Tyrconnel quickly; “you were one of 
those who did not think at all — on this subject, I mean. 
When you began to think, you saw the truth in its com- 
pleteness.’ ’ 

She smiled a little. “At least,” she said, “I am 
glad that it was at the feet of St. Peter I was brought 
to understand his Catholic and Roman faith. And 
this being so, I think I might ask him to obtain a great 
favor for me. 1 will make a pilgrimage to his tomb for 
the purpose. ” 

“ Let us go now,” said Kathleen quickly, “ and we 
will ask all together for you. I am always glad to go 
to St. Peter’s. Come.” 


224 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXIII 


LET ME HELP YOU, 


ROM the hill “ which saw St. Peter die” to the 



X grand Basilica where his body lies is not a great 
distance, and the road lies through one of the most in- 
teresting quarters of Rome. Every foot of the way is 
filled with memories of the warlike clash and splendid 
tumult of ages when men did and dared great deeds. 
Every tower and ruined wall is written over and over 
again with records of history stretching back through 
centuries. Great figures seem to step forth on every 
side ; pagan philosopher and Christian saint, soldiers 
of ancient Rome and martyrs of Christ, heathen em- 
perors and mediaeval kings, jostle one another, as it 
were ; there is not a page of human history which does 
not touch, in one form or another, this great centre of 
human existence. And it is like a burst of exultant 
music when from the narrow, winding, deep-colored 
streets one enters the noble piazza of St. Peter’s, with 
its encircling colonnades, its obelisk and springing foun- 
tains. All the varied pageant of ages seems to lead to 
this — space to kneel at the feet of Christ’s Vicar. 

Cecil’s heart bounded with the thought that she had 
no longer the sense of alienation with which she first 
entered here. She had felt then that in all this great- 
ness she had no part — she was a stranger and an out- 
sider, cut off from the inheritance of all the past, which 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


225 


Stretched back in unbroken continuity to the hour when 
the Fisherman of Galilee entered the city of the Caesars. 
Everything surrounding her, every sentiment, every 
tradition, every embodied idea, appealed so irresistibly 
to her love of greatness, that she felt this alienation as 
only a few souls feel it — a few who cannot be fed on 
the narrow and colorless traditions of Protestantism, 
and who, standing amid the mighty monuments of 
Rome, realize how great an inheritance has been wrested 
from them. 

“ I cannot tell you,” she said to her companions, as 
they crossed the portico, ” how painfully I felt myself 
an alien when I entered here first. It was a conscious- 
ness which overwhelmed me so that I could hardly even 
: admire. Everything seemed saying to me, ‘ In all this 
you have no share.’ I could not console myself with 
i any fiction of ‘a common Christianity,’ for I 
; what I had felt before — that Christianity is Roman or it 
is nothing. And I was among the number of those who 
stood apart from it, and had no right in this ancient 
sanctuary save as a stranger and sightseer, admitted by 
courtesy within its walls !” 

” But now you come as a child to her rightful inher- 
itance,” said Kathleen, holding out her hand ; and 
while Tyrconnel lifted the heavy leathern curtain, she 
drew Cecil within the marvellous interior, where maj- 
esty of space and harmony of proportion, such as man 
never planned before, are united with a richness of 
color, a splendor of decoration, passing all descrip- 
tion. As they slowly walked up the vast nave toward 
the circle of star-like lamps which mark the tomb of 
the Apostles. Tvrconnel said softly, as if thinking 
aloud ; 


226 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ ‘ This shall come to pass— 

From yonder altar to their kingdoms down 
The kings once more shall pace, sceptre and crown 
On that dim sea of marble and of brass 
Showering, as angels on the sea of glass, 

Their amaranthine wreaths.’ 

Do you know our Irish poet, Aubrey de Vere ?” he 
asked, in answer to Cecil’s inquiring glance. “ He has 
written a beautiful set of sonnets which he calls ‘ Urbs 
Roma,’ and from which those lines are taken. There 
is hardly a spot in Rome where some thought of his is 
not recalled.” 

” I know many of his poems,” Cecil answered, ” and 
I must find the sonnets of which you speak. Kathleen 
has repeated several for me. I do not wonder that this 
‘ dim sea of marble ’ should suggest to him that which 
we dream of as stretching before the throne of God. 

I can never think of anything else when I see it spread- 
ing away before me.” 

It is indeed a vista of unsurpassed beauty which this 
great nave of St. Peter’s offers — the vast expanse of 
polished marble underfoot, the richly gilded roof above, 
the splendid sculptured arches opening on each side 
glimpses into the chapels which line the aisles, the 
noble space that marks the soaring dome, under which 
stands the canopied high altar, and the glory of golden 
light which at the end of the tribune pours above the 
chair of St. Peter — all unite to form a picture of un-^ 
approachable majesty and magnificence. i 

But it was when Cecil knelt at the marble balustrade j 
which guards the opening before the great confessional i 
that she was conscious of an emotion far beyond the 
power of words to express. Ardent faith and passion-: 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


227 


ate gratitude almost overwhelmed her as she made her 
earnest solicitation that God would enable her to show 
by living deeds her sense of what He had done for her. 

When they left the church Tyrconnel was struck by 
the expression of her face. There was a radiance on it 
and a light in her eyes as of one who had seen a vision. 
As they stood on the steps of the portico while their 
carriage drove up, she looked toward the Vatican and 
said to Kathleen : “ The hands are the hands of Leo, 
but the voice is the voice of Peter, and it bade me go 
and work for man in token of gratitude to God. So I 
think I may safely believe that the way will be opened 
for me.” 

” I am sure of that,” was the earnest answer. It was 
the first time that Cecil had spoken, save in general 
terms, of anything that had been said in the last audi- 
ence which the Holy Father had granted her — a private 
audience, given at the special request of the Abbe 
Ravoux, who knew Rome well, and knew just what 
channels to employ to gain whatever end he had in 
view. 

It was in a mood of positive exaltation that Miss 
Lorimer went home that day. Such moods come prob- 
ably now and then to all of us, but they come most of 
all to the impressionable and enthusiastic — especially to 
those who have dreamed high dreams and before whom 
seems to open a vista of possibility for their fulfilment. 
At such times we neither see nor heed all the difficulties 
that must encompass this fulfilment, as they encompass 
everything earthly. Our gaze is on the sunlit heights, 
and we do not mark the toilsome, cloud-wrapped way 
that lies between us and the point we fain would reach. 
To Cecil, who had known little of disappointment, it 


228 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


seemed as if a providential way had opened by which 
she might accomplish all the good she longed to do ; 
she had only to pour the surplus wealth that burdened 
her into Tyrconnel’s hands to see the fulfilment of plans 
so beneficent and wide-reaching that they appeared the 
wonderful realization of her own ideals. She was so 
absorbed in this thought that it did not occur to her to 
consider how it would be possible for Tyrconnel to 
accept and use her wealth, even though it were for 
ends wholly impersonal. There could be no doubt 
that Cecil was open to the charge so often brought 
against enthusiasts — her head was sometimes in the 
clouds. 

Several days passed before she had an opportunity to 
speak to Tyrconnel on the subject burning at her heart. 
But at last they were alone one afternoon in the grounds 
of the Villa Albani ; the rest of their party were still 
lingering within the Villa, but they had passed into the 
garden. It is impossible to imagine anything more 
beautiful than this spot, and, beguiled by the spell of 
its classic grace and loveliness, Cecil had almost forgot- 
ten her purpose until Tyrconnel suggested, after they 
had been walking for some time, that they should rest 
a while in a charming nook, where a fountain filled the 
silence with its musical murmur, and the white shapes 
of statues gleamed against the dark green of cypress 
and ilex. Cecil placed herself on a seat, and then it 
suddenly occurred to her that here was her opportunity. 
She looked up at Tyrconnel, who stood beside her, and 
with characteristic frankness plunged at once into the 
subject so near her heart. 

“ Mr. Tyrconnel,” she said, a slight tension of voice 
alone betraying her nervousness, ” do you remember 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 229 

what you said to me about your difficulties in Ireland 
the other day at San Pietro in Montorio ?” 

“ I remember,” answered Tyrconnel, smiling, ” that 
I talked at length and very egotistically. You were 
good enough to encourage me in egotism by your inter- 
est. I hope you have not repented of it.” 

” No,” she replied, gravely. ” I was very much in- 
terested in all that you told me, and especially in your 
plans for improving the lives of the people. They 
seemed to me very wise plans — such as are certain to 
succeed and do good, because they would enable people 
to help themselves.” 

” I am glad you think so well of them,” he said. 
” Nothing is certain until it has been tested ; but 1 
believe that they would succeed — if they could be 
tried. But,” he added, ” that is an insurmountable 
‘if.’” 

” It need not be insurmountable,” she said quickly, 
” if you will let others help you. If some one who is 
very rich — richer than anybody need be — should offer 
you the means for this good work, would you refuse 
it ?” 

‘‘Well, yes,” answered Tyrconnel, after a moment’s 
surprised pause ; “ I should have no alternative but to 
refuse, because I could have no certainty that the 
money would not be thrown away. I would risk my 
own if I had it, but I could not risk that of some one 
else.” 

‘‘ Not even if some one else were more than willing 
for it to be risked — as willing as you could be ?” 

‘‘ Not even then, for the responsibility would be mine. 
And the whole world will tell you that philanthropic 
schemes are of all schemes the least likely to make a 


230 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


profitable return. But why do you ask ? Do you 
know of any one anxious to play at philanthropy ?” 

“ No,” she answered, and something in her tone 
showed that she was a little wounded, ” I do not know 
of any one anxious to play at philanthropy ; but I know 
some one who is very anxious, more anxious than I can 
tell you, to do some good — some real, lasting good — in 
the world with a superfluity of money which happens 
to be hers.” 

” Miss Lorimer !” The next moment he had seated 
himself beside her. ” Forgive me if I have misunder- 
stood you,” he said earnestly. ” I see now that you 
are speaking of yourself. How can I thank you for 
such a generous thought ! It is like you — to wish to 
put out your hand and help wherever you know that 
suffering exists. I am grateful for myself and for my 
poor people, but you must see that it is impossible for 
me to take what you so generously offer.” 

” Why is it impossible ?” she asked, turning on him 
a glance of eloquent appeal. ” You do not know how 
long I have been desiring and seeking a way to spend 
my wealth in doing some real, practical good. And 
now that I have found the way, why should you deny 
me the happiness of doing it ? I can never find a better 
way — of that I am sure, and you must be sure too. 
Let me help you, then. Let me put my useless money 
into those things of which you spoke — cultivated lands 
and good houses, and industries to give the people em- 
ployment. That is just the work I have dreamed of. 
You will not — surely you can not — deny me the oppor- 
tunity to realize this dream !” 

How did Tyrconnel restrain himself from taking the 
hands she unconsciously clasped in her appeal and lift- j 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


231 


ing them to his lips ? He hardly knew. His heart 
leaped, his head seemed for an instant whirling as she 
leaned toward him saying, “ Let me help you !” All 
the love he had never before acknowledged suddenly 
asserted itself with a force that almost deprived him of 
self-control. He did not know afterward how he re- 
sisted the temptation which assailed him so strongly — 
the temptation to speak, to cry out passionately, “ I 
love you — I love you !” Ah, if only he might pray her 
to share his labors, to help him indeed ! But the 
money of which she spoke stood like a barrier between 
them, and the thought of his own poverty nerved him 
to silence. The conviction flashed upon him like a 
scorching flame that if he had ever meant to ask her to 
share his life he had waited too long — it was too late to 
speak after she had told him 'of her superfluity of 
wealth, and he had told her how sorely he needed 
money. Thoughts like these — thoughts on which a 
whole life hinge — can pass quickly. There was not a 
very long pause before he answered Cecil’s last words 
with a gravity which chilled her. 

“ My dear Miss Lorimer, you forget that what you 
are asking me to do is to allow you to spend your 
money on my estate for the benefit of my tenants. You 
must see, if you will pause a moment and think, that 
such a thing is impossible in the world as it is at pres- 
ent constituted. Your generous ardor leads you to for- 
get this, but I am forced to remember it. For your 
sake, as well as for the sake of my people, I wish that 
it were possible, but it is not.” 

In the sharpness of her disappointment tears welled 
into her eyes, and startled heiself as well as Tyrconnel 
by suddenly dropping in a crystal shower. He uttered 


232 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

a hasty exclamation, which she did not catch, for she 
was making an effort to speak composedly. 

“ I did not mean to be so childish,” she said, lifting 
her handkerchief to her eyes. “ But when one hopes a 
great deal it is hard to bear disappointment. I had so 
long been looking for such an opportunity, and when 
I found it I did not think of being denied. It seems so 
simple a thing and so natural a thing to spend what 
one has in doing good, that I have never considered 
what the world would think or say in such a case. 
Therefore I have made, it seems, a great mistake. You 
must pardon me. I have troubled you and done no 
good.” 

“Troubled me!” he repeated, passionately. “Do 
you think it is troubling me to have showed me the pos- 
sibilities that lie in such a heart and such a nature as 
yours ? From this day you have made the world a 
better place to me ; for I have seen with my own eyes 
how gentle and lofty thoughts transmute themselves 
into noble deeds. I wish I could thank you for the 
revelation of yourself, as well as for all that you desire 
to do ; but the only return I seem able to make is to 
wound and disappoint you 1 Forgive me, if you can. 
You do not know how hard it is to me.” 

Something in the tone of his last words made her 
glance at him quickly. What she saw in his face or 
read in his eyes — what unconscious betrayal of himself 
he made — it is difficult to tell ; but she suddenly rose 
to her feet. 

“ I am sorry,” she said, “ that I have made anything 
hard to you. It was not what I meant ; but I have 
been told that I am visionary, and perhaps it is true. 
Probably this is something I should not have thought 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


233 


of. Let us try to forget it. And now Mrs. Severn will 
be wondering where I am. Shall we find the others ?” 

It was with a sense as of a horrible necessity that he 
turned with her down the path which led to the Villa. 
He knew that she felt herself misunderstood, that he 
seemed cold and unsympathetic ; he longed miserably 
to express a part at least of all that was in his heart, 
but how could he express a part without uttering the 
whole ? He felt like a man under a spell of malign 
enchantment as he walked by her side down the long, 
box-bordered avenue, and found no words which his lips 
dared utter. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

“ NOT OF — HIM.” 

L ike all impulsive people, Cecil Lorimer had many 
a time been compelled to regret having spoken 
or acted too hastily ; but never before had she suffered 
from this cause so acutely as she did now, when realizing 
what a mistake she had committed in making an offer 
of pecuniary assistance to Tyrconnel. That power of 
self-control and instinctive repression of all outward 
signs of emotion, which the conventional life of the 
world teaches so effectually, enabled her to resume her 
usual manner on rejoining the party in the Villa. She 
simply ignored the aching, stinging sense of disappoint- 'i 
ment and humiliation by which she had been at first | 
overwhelmed, and which had betrayed her into that j 
uncharacteristic burst of tears, as a brave spirit often 
ignores physical pain and infirmity when occasion re- | 
quires. Not only to the brilliant company gathered j 
that evening in Mrs. Severn’s salon, but to Tyrconnel as | 
well, did she seem quite her ordinary self. But nature 
— particularly so high-strung a nature as hers — though | 
it may, under the constraint of a resolute will, manifest fl 
wonderful pluck and endurance in an emergency, must a 
inevitably give way after a time ; and when she had at 
last gained the solitude of her chamber that night, and 
had dismissed her maid, all the restraint she had im- 
posed on herself vanished — dropping away from her 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


235 


like a mask that is thrown aside. Pale and agitated, 
she walked up and down the floor with hasty steps and 
clasped hands, self-reproachful, mortified, and miser- 
able. 

“ How could I have been so stupid, so senseless, as 
to do such a thing !” she exclaimed to herself, in a 
paroxysm of unavailing regret. “ How could I have 
imagined for a moment that he would accept from a 
stranger — one on whom he had no claim, and who had 
no claim on him — such an obligation ! I see now that, 
as he said, it is impossible. Oh, what must he think 
of me — what can he think but that I intended — that I 
wished — ” 

She flung herself into a deep chair that stood in a re- 
cess beside a window, and bowed her burning face into 
her hands, a few tears trickling through the slender 
fingers. 

“ And yet it seemed to me — it does seem to me — 
reasonable, natural, that of my useless abundance I 
should endeavor to help those who need help so sorely,” 
she murmured. ” He ought to have known — he ought 
to have understood ! It is ungenerous of him — it is 
unjust ! He is depriving these people who are in such 
dire straits of poverty of the comfort and relief which a 
word of his would bring them. I will speak to him 
again ; I will ask him if he thinks he has a right to do 
this. I will at least make him understand” — she lifted 
her head haughtily — “ that I was thinking only of the 
poor people, not of — him. ’ ’ 

But she did not speak again on the subject ; for the 
more she thought of her terrible blunder, the more dis- 
tressed and embarrassed was she ; and, despite her 
utmost efforts to avoid any change of manner, this em- 


236 A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 

barrassment showed itself, when she met Tyrconnel on 
the following day, in a certain reserve and coldness 
which cut him to the heart. He could not see that he 
had given her any cause for resentment, or that he 
could have acted differently ; yet he was miserable and 
self-reproachful — ready to blame himself rather than 
her for a misapprehension that had been caused by no 
fault on his part ; longing to ask in how he had offended 
her and to deprecate her displeasure, but having neither 
courage nor opportunity for such explanation. In 
truth, if opportunity had been afforded him — and it was ; 
not — what could he have said ? He knew that if he 
spoke at all the expression of his love would force itself ; 
from his lips ; and he said to himself that to speak of j 
love now would simply be tantamount to an acknowl- 
edgment that he had held back so long as he did not 
know of her wealth, and came forward as soon as he ♦ 
was assured of it. | 

For several days he debated with himself what he \ 
should, or rather what he could, do, and finally decided ■ 
to go back to Ireland. It was useless to remain in ^ 
Rome waiting for the impossible — a return of the frank, 
friendly association between Cecil and himself which 
had been such a happiness to him. There was more 
pain than pleasure in meeting her now, as he felt in 
every word, every tone, a change so subtle as to be in- « 
describable in words, yet so decided as to admit of no 
doubt as to its existence. That she strove to conceal 
this change, especially in the presence of others, was 
evident ; but equally apparent was the fact that she did 
not succeed in doing so ; that each one of their little 
circle perceived and wondered at it — each probably 
finding or fancying a different solution of the mystery. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


237 


That the effect on himself was also noticed he could not 
doubt. 

It would have been impossible not to notice it ; for 
though his manner did not alter, his appearance did. 
He grew thin and pale ; his face when at rest wearing 
the same expression by which Cecil had been both 
struck and touched when she saw that face first so 
many months before. And to read the suffering thus 
legibly marked on it was hard to her — very hard. Never 
yet had her woman’s pride permitted her to acknowl- 
edge in words, even in the deepest recesses of her own 
thoughts, that she loved this man who had never ex- 
pressed love for her ; but she did admit to herself that 
she pitied him with that passion of pain and admiration 
blended together which is seldom excited save by a 
contemplation of undeserved suffering. 

It is not to be supposed that Kathleen Tyrconnel, 
with her quick sympathy and keen observation, was 
long in divining the cloud that had risen between the 
two people whom she fully believed to be formed for 
. each other. She had carefully refrained from so much 
as hinting to her brother the conjecture of the Abbe 
and herself concerning Cecil’s fortune, knowing well 
that the very suspicion of such a thing would be a lion 
in the way of his seeking to win Cecil’s heart. She 
had a hundred times felicitated herself on the oppor- 
tune illness which brought them again together, and 
rejoiced with exceeding great joy as day by day she 
beheld the interest with which they had been mutually 
inspired from their first meeting deepening into a life- 
long attachment. And to see all her expectations sud- 
denly fade away was the sharpest disappointment and 
pain she had ever known. 


238 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


She did not speak to either of them on the subject, a 
natural delicacy restraining her from manifesting con- 
sciousness so far as Cecil was concerned ; while an in- 
stinctive comprehension that it would be like touching 
a bai‘e nerve of his heart to question her brother pre- 
vented her saying a word to him. Into the ear of her 
good friend the Abbe, however, she poured out freely 
her apprehensions and laments. 

“ There is certainly something the matter betvreen 
them,” she said, interlacing her fingers, and looking 
wistfully into the kind eyes bent upon her. ” What 
can it be ? Do you think she can have refused 
him ?” 

” I doubt if it is that,” the Abbe answered. ” Some- 
thing is the matter — yes. But do not be in too great 
haste to despond. It may be merely some little mis- 
understanding — ’ ’ 

He paused and smiled. 

” A lover’s quarrel, you mean ?” 

” Well, yes. Such an occurrence would not be un- 
precedented.” 

She shook her head decidedly. ” Neither of them is 
the sort of person for that,” she said. ” You know 
Gerald — that he is not ; nor, I assure you, is Miss Lori- 
mer. It is so strange !” she went on sadly. ” I cannot 
imagine the meaning of it, for even if, as I suspected at 
first, he has offered himself and been rejected, that 
surely would not affect her so much. From little things 
I have heard Miss Marriott say, she must be too much 
accustomed to admiration to take the disappointment 
of her rejected lovers much to heart. And she does 
take this to heart.” 

” For that reason I think we may hope that the 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


239 


estrangement is only tempoiary,” said the Abbe. “ Is 
her manner to yourself changed at all ?” 

“ No ; she is as cordial to me as ever, only I see less 
of her. She always has some excuse now for making 
her visits very short, and she never comes alone. She 
and Miss Marriott were here half an hour ago, but they 
stayed only a few minutes, said they were engaged to 
dine with some friends of theirs who have lately arrived 
in Rorhe, and could not see us again this evening.” 

” That was a reasonable excuse.” 

‘‘Yes, but only an excuse. Oh,” she resumed after 
a momentary pause, ‘‘ it breaks my heart to look at 
Gerald — to see how he is suffering ! And I was so cer- 
tain that a brighter life was opening for him. It was 
not that I thought so much of Miss Lorimer’s money — 
I am sure she is very wealthy, though she never told 
me so. I thought of it a little, I must confess ; for 
money would make such a difference in his life. But it 
was herself. She has such a fine nature — so like Ger- 
ald’s own ! And he loves her passionately ! I can see 
, that. It breaks my heart !” 

The Abbe’s own heart was very sad for her as he 
tried to say some words of encouragement and consola- 
tion, at which she shook her head hopelessly. 

‘‘I am so afiaid,” she said, ‘‘ that he will go away 
and lose the opportunity of ever making up the diffi- 
culty, whatever it may be ! Every day I expect him to 
say that he is going.” 

Her fears were prophetic ; for almost as she spoke he 
came into the room, and, after greeting the priest with 
his usual cheerfulness and warmth, and talking for a 
few minutes on indifferent topics, he turned to her and 
said : 


240 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ I have had letters from Ireland — don’t be alarmed !” 
— she had started nervously — “ there is nothing unusual 
in them. But my presence is needed there, as you may 
suppose. And since you are now well again I must go 
— sorry as I am to leave you.” 

He spoke very tenderly, then resumed conversation 
with the Abbe, in order, as she knew, to give her time 
to recover from the effect of his announcement. 

‘‘ You must go ?” she said, when a few minutes 
later they were alone, the Abbe having soon taken 
leave. 

” Yes,” he answered, with a sigh, ” I must go. 
Maloney writes me that there has been some tampering 
with the people — with that black sheep Pat Riley in 
particular. It is very important for me to be there on 
this account, and it is better on every account that I 
should go,” he added, in a significant tone. 

He was standing opposite Kathleen, and she looked 
up at him with such a questioning, apprehensive glance 
that he smiled, though sadly. 

” What is it, Gerald ?” she asked wistfully. “ Some- 
thing is the matter — I have seen that. What is it ?” 

” Nothing that words can mend,” was the reply. 
” It is only that I have come back from dreamland to 
reality.” 

” But she loves you,” said the girl, in a low, eager 
tone. ‘‘ She loves you, Gerald — I am sure of it.” 

He shook his head. ” No ; the interest she has mani- 
fested toward me is not for myself, but for the work I 
am trying to do. How do I know this } From her 
own lips. She offered me money — any amount of 
money”— a faint smile, that had both humor and a dash 
of bitterness in it, moving his lips for an instant as he 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


241 


Spoke. “ She is very wealthy, it seems, though I did 
not know it.’’ 

“ I have suspected it,” said Kathleen. 

” I wish you had told me — warned me,” he answered. 
” But, after all, it would have been the same if you 
had.” 

” Did she — have you” — began the girl, but broke 
down, and only concluded the question by a glance. 

” Been rejected ? No. Fortunately I never offered 
myself.” 

” But you love her ?” 

” Yes, God help me, I love her. But I shall never 
ask her to marry me.” 

” O Gerald, I am sure she loves you !” cried Kath- 
leen, with passionate earnestness. ” Don’t let pride 
stand between you and happiness. Don’t throw away — ” 

He motioned with his hand to her to stop. ” You do 
not know what you are saying. You are entirely mis- 
taken, as I told you before. It was not love for me 
that you observed in her — no ! — or she would not have 
changed as she has. It was sympathy with my work. 
She might, perhaps, have married me in order to aid 
me in this wor-k, had I asked her in time ; for if I had 
spoken before I knew of her wealth she might have 
believed that it was herself I loved. Now^ having waited 
apparently until I learned that she is rich, she could not 
but suspect my motives to be mercenary.” 

” How can you think such things of her !” the girl 
exclaimed, almost indignantly. ” She is incapable of 
such suspicion ! She is so generous, so noble — ” 

” Yes, she is generous and noble,” he said, in a tone 
that sounded almost cold, so great was his effort to re- 
press his emotion. ” Do you suppose I do not know 


242 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


that ? But it is the generous and the noble who most 
scorn the mercenary and the mean — as she would take 
me to be if I now professed love for her. And so I 
should be, in a sense, since, as you know, I could not 
marry a woman without fortune, poor as I am myself ; 
and therefore were I to marry her it would be because 
of, if not for, her fortune.” 

Kathleen looked at him in despair, it was so plain to 
her that he was wantonly, as it were, passing by the 
happiness that might be his ; and so intolerable to feel 
that she had no power to prevent his doing so. 

‘‘ Gerald, dear Gerald !” she said at last, ” if you 
have no mercy on yourself, think of her. You have 
given her every reason to believe that your heart is 
hers. Are you going away without a word ? I do not 
see how you can fail to perceive that it would be dis- 
honorable in you to do so.” 

Tyrconnel’s heart gave a great bound, his eye light- 
ened, and he flushed. Ah, if he could but believe this ! 
If he could but believe that honor demanded the sacri- 
fice of his pride — of what he considered self-respect — he 
would make the sacrifice, and, perhaps, gain happiness. 
But he could not believe it, and the glow vanished as 
quickly as it had come. 

” No,” he said. ‘‘ I love Cecil Lorimer with the one, 
exclusive passion of my life. But I am poor and she is 
very rich. 1 shall never ask her to be my wife.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXV. 

“ I DID LOVE YOU.” 

I T chanced that Cecil on returning home from the 
hasty visit to Kathleen which the latter mentioned 
to the Abbe, found a large basket of flowers that had 
arrived for her during her absence. Partly a feeling 
that she had been neglecting Kathleen lately — visiting 
the sin of the brother, or her own folly, on the sister’s 
head — and partly a remembrance of the wistful look on 
Kathleen’s face as the girl said, ” I see so little of you 
now !” inspired her instantly with the idea of taking 
these flowers to Miss Tyrconnel. Therefore on their 
way to the dinner to which they were going she stopped 
the carriage as they were passing Mrs. Tyrconnel’s 
apartment, and, after a word of explanation to her com- 
panions, alighted and went in for a moment to present 
the fragrant offering. 

With the habit of familiarity acquired while Kathleen 
was ill, she did not cause her presence to be announced 
by a servant, but, passing through the antechamber 
alone, lifted the portiere and entered salon during the 
moment of silence in which Tyrconnel was wrestling 
with the temptation excited by Kathleen’s words. 

His head was bent, his eyes fastened on the fire ; and 
Kathleen was watching him with eager, strained gaze, 
her whole attention thus absorbed ; so that neither of 
them heard the faint rustle of drapery, and Miss Lori- 


244 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


mer had advanced half-way across the large room when, 
his eyes still fixed on the leaping flames, he spoke. 

A world of emotion surged through her heart as his 
words cut clearly upon her ear — “ No, I love Cecil 
Lorimer with the one, exclusive passion of my life. 
But I am poor and she is very rich. I shall never ask 
her to be my wife.” 

There was another silence of scarcely an instant’s 
duration ; but how much of thought, joy. pain can be 
crowded into the briefest measure of time in moments 
of strong feeling ! Cecil’s first consciousness was a 
sense of exultant happiness. He loved her ! And swift 
as a flash her heart responded with the unuttered but 
passionate cry, ” And I love you !” Then came the 
recoil. An icy hand seemed to seize her heart and still 
its wild throbbing, restoring as by magic her presence 
of mind and composure. She saw that neither the 
brother nor sister was aware of her presence, and, hop- 
ing to leave the room unperceived, turned to go — or 
rather she was about to turn ; for so entirely were her 
thoughts now awake to the exigence of the moment, 
that she lifted carefully the folds of her rustling silk 
drapery before moving. 

There was a slight sound caused by the motion of her 
hand, however, and it attracted their notice. Both 
glanced up, and there before them stood Cecil, looking 
more beautiful than they had ever seen her before ; 
for she was in a toilet the richness of which adorned 
her beauty as the setting of a diamond enhances its 
brilliance. The friends to whom she was going being 
aware of her wealth, she was reluctant to appear singu- 
lar in their eyes by dressing differently from what had 
been her custom when they saw her last ; and this had 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


245 


induced her to yield to the persuasions of her maid 
with regard to her toilet for the evening. And so she 
wore a rich gown of white silk and priceless lace, with 
gems glittering about her slender throat and on her 
arms, from which a light wrap had partly fallen. 

As Tyrconnel’s eye rested on her he thought in the 
first instant of his gaze that such a radiant presence 
must be a vision of his own imagination. But this 
fancy was dispelled when, becoming conscious that re- 
treat was impossible, she moved quickly to Kathleen’s 
side, and laid on her lap the roses which she had been 
carrying. 

“ I called just a moment,” she said, in almost her 
ordinary voice, “ to bring you these. I found them on 
my return home, and their perfume reminded me of 
you. Good-by again. Good-evening, Mr. Tyrconnel.” 

She bowed slightly, and was moving away when 
Tyrconnel stepped forward and stood beside her. 

“ Did you hear my last words ?” he asked, in a very 
quiet tone — a tone so quiet that involuntarily she 
turned to reply ; and as she encountered the look with 
which he was regarding her a vivid color leaped to her 
cheek and her heart beat suffocatingly. But she con- 
trolled herself, and answered in a voice very nearly as 
steady as his own : 

“ I heard them, yes ; but it shall be as though I had 
not. It was my fault — though by accident — that I 
‘ stumbled on your counsel.’ I have to apologize for 
entering so unceremoniously. I will not do so again.” 

” Cecil !” he cried. 

It was a passionate cry that compelled her eyes, which 
she had already averted, to return to the gaze that he 
was bending on her ; and during a passing instant they 


246 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Stood face to face, Kathleen meanwhile regarding them 
with a breathless, indescribable expression of mingled 
hope and fear. For the first time Tyrconnel permitted 
his voice and his eyes to speak the language of his 
heart ; and there was one — just one — flash of response 
in the glance that met his own, before Cecil turned 
coldly away, refusing to see his extended hand. 

But Kathleen started up, sprang to her side, and 
seizing her hand placed it in that of her lover, exclaim- 
ing : 

“ Gerald ! Cecil ! do not let pride stand between you ! 
You love each other ! What is money or the want of 
it to this love ?” 

“ Nothing,” answered Cecil, looking round at the 
pleading countenance of the speaker. ” To me abso- 
lutely nothing. If he had held out his hand when I en- 
tered this room I would have given him my own with- 
out a falter of doubt or hesitation. But while every 
pulse of my heart was beating for him — and he must 
have felt and known it, as I felt and knew that his was 
beating for me — he was coldly weighing both these 
hearts in the scale against my fortune and his pride. 
And his pride outweighed them. And he thinks that 
he is not mercenary ! In my eyes the veriest fortune- 
hunter could not be more so !” 

” You are right,” said Tyrconnel, in a low tone. ” I 
have acted unworthily in that I have allowed a thought 
of — of anything to come between us. In my inmost 
soul I have felt this. But — ” 

” But you lacked the courage to incur an unjust judg- 
ment of the world — ” 

” No !” he interrupted, speaking quickly, almost vio- 
lently. ” It was not the world I feared, or even remem- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


247 


bered the existence of. It was of yourself that I was 
thinking — it was that you might misinterpret my mo- 
tives.” 

''If'' she exclaimed, suddenly facing round on him 
again, her eyes blazing with indignant scorn. “And 
you knew me so little as that ! You thought I would 
suspect you of wishing to marry my fortune, not 
myself ?” 

“ Yes,” he answered, a dark flush mounting to his 
brow. “ I was blind and a coward ; I see that now. 
But, O Cecil, if I had dared to believe that you returned 
my love — ’ ’ 

“ I did love you !” she exclaimed, in a low but vehe- 
ment tone. “ I regarded you as the one man who ever 
realized my ideal of all that is loftiest in faith and 
honor. I admired, I loved you !” Her voice had sunk 
lower and lower, but rose again as she added, with in- 
tense disdain, “ But that is past. I will tear out my 
heart sooner than waste its love longer on one who has 
proved himself so unworthy of it !” 

He had been holding her hand, without the slightest 
resistance on her part, ever since Kathleen had placed 
it in his grasp ; but now she hastily disengaged it, and, 
with a passionate gesture as of tearing out and casting 
away her heart, turned quickly and passed from the 
room. 

There are occasions in life when the mind seems 
gifted with a double consciousness, it might almost be 
said a double individualism, by which it is enabled to 
exist in two separate worlds at the same time — a world 
of thought and one of merely mechanical action. It 
was so with Cecil Lorimer during the evening which 
followed. Almost blindly she made her way down the 


248 


A WOMAN OF FORTtfNE. 


stairs alone on leaving Tyrconnel, the latter not attempt- 
ing to accompany her ; and on gaining the open air she 
put her hand to her throat with a sense of suffocation. 
Her heart was burning, her veins throbbing, her nerves 
tingling with such a passion of mingled and all but 
overpowering emotion as had never in her whole ex- 
istence assailed her before. Indignation at and scorn 
of what seemed to her so cowardly and mercenary a 
spirit in Tyrconnel ; keen disappointment in seeing her 
ideal thus cast down from the pinnacle on which her 
imagination had placed him ; a bitter sense of pain as 
she felt that the opportunity she had so long been seek- 
ing — to use the talent of wealth given her — had escaped 
her grasp just when she thought she had at last secured 
it ; and, dominant over all, a half-reluctant and yet ex- 
ultant sense of happiness in the certainty of Tyrconnel’s 
love — all these conflicting sentiments were raging in 
her breast, while with sparkling eyes and gay words 
she was making herself the centre of attraction and 
admiration. So easy and apparently natural did she 
seem that even Mrs. Severn and Miss Marriott were 
deceived, and thought with pleasure that the slight 
cloud which had lately fallen over her was entirely dis- 
pelled. 

Not so Craven, who was one of the guests present. 
He had been watching some minutes for the entrance 
of Mrs. Severn’s party, and though it was not Miss 
Lorimer’s stately figure that his eye sought first when 
the three names were announced, his glance was in- 
stantly caught and riveted by the bright bloom of her 
cheek and the unusual animation of her manner. “ She 
has just seen Tyrconnel !” was his mental comment ; 
“ and I do not envy him his sensations at the present 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


249 


moment, judging by the expression of her eyes. I 
never saw her look like that before.” An hour or two 
later this astute, gentleman said to Miss Marriott : 

” Your friend is a beautiful woman, and when it 
pleases her, a charming one. But I should not like to 
be her lover.” 

Cecil, meanwhile, was becoming conscious of that 
reaction after strong excitement which had been very 
familiar to her when as a child she was in the habit of 
falling into violent fits of anger, but which for some 
years past she had not permitted herself to incur. Noth 
ing taxes the vital forces so severely as the unrestrained 
indulgence of passion ; and she felt this very keenly 
when, to her great relief, she at length found herself in 
the carriage on her return home. A sense of languor, 
apathy, profound depression both mental and physical, 
had succeeded her late unnatural excitement of mood. 
With the briefest of good-nights to her friends, she re- 
tired at once on reaching her apartment ; and so thor- 
oughly wearied was she that her head had scarcely 
touched her pillow before she was in the deep, dream- 
less sleep of utter exhaustion. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 


“ I MUST GO.” 


HEN Cecil so violently withdrew her hand from 



vv his, and with bitter words of reproach left him, 
Tyrconnel flung himself into a chair, and, leaning his 
face down on a table beside him, remained silent and 
motionless for a long time — so long a time that Kath- 
leen at length, going to his side, bent over him. 

” O Gerald !” she exclaimed, ” can you forgive me 
for being the cause of so much suffering to you ? I 
who would endure any suffering myself to spare you ! 
Oh, to think that I should have brought this wretched- 
ness upon you !” 

He lifted his head, and looked at her with surprise. 
” You !” he said. ” My dear sister, what can you 
mean ? How have you — ” 

” How have I caused your unhappiness ?” she inter- 
rupted, in a miserable voice. ” By bringing you into 
this association, which has proved so fatal to your 
peace. Ah, if only 1 had avoided instead of cultivating 
her friendship, as an instinct from the first warned me 
to do ! I knew — Gerald, when you returned, and told 
us of that accident at sea, you mentioned her very 
slightly, but I fancied that you loved her even then.’ ’ 

‘‘ Yes, even then,” he said — ” from the first moment 
I saw her, I think. And that night when we were so 
near death, and she asked me to take her on deck if the 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


251 


vessel was foundering, God forgive me if I almost 
hoped that might be the end, and thought that I could 
gladly go down into those icy depths with my arms 
clasped around her. No” — as a slight sob from Kath- 
leen caught his ear — ” I did not forget you, my poor 
darling, or my mother. I thought that my death might 
be the best solution of all the trouble, for you as well 
as for myself. But God willed otherwise. And to the 
difficulties that already beset me there was added the 
rending of my heart in parting from her — in feeling 
that under other circumstances I might perhaps have 
won her love ; that if I could have permitted my heart 
to appeal to hers — ” 

He paused with a deep, long-drawn breath, and was 
silent for a moment ; then suddenly becoming aware 
that Kathleen had sunk to her knees, and was looking 
at him with all her soul in her eyes, he rose hastily, 
lifted her from her lowly position, and half carrying her 
to her chair beside the fire, drew another close to it, sat 
down, and went on, in the tone of one pouring out the 
fulness of his heart : 

” The pain and trouble I had to endure on reaching 
home — the sordid cares, the miserable scenes with my 
mother, even the seeing you, poor child, condemned to 
exist in an atmosphere of bitterness and contention that 
made your life sad — would have been yet worse than 
they were had not this other pain dwarfed their impor- 
tance and dulled their edge. I often looked at you, and 
thanked God that sad as your life was it was exempt 
from the sharp suffering that was gnawing at my 
heart.” 

” You suffered so much then ! And how much worse 
it is now !” said Kathleen, in a despairing tone. ” Oh, 


252 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


that I had never met her ! Oh, that I had not fallen ill ; 
and brought you here to be made miserable !” j 

“ I am not miserable now,’' he answered. “I am , 
happy — inexpressibly happy. Can you not under- 
stand ?” he continued, in reply to her look of astonish- 
ment. “ She loves me ! — you heard her say it. She 
loves me !” 

“Yes,” responded Kathleen, “I heard her say it. 
But she left you in anger — with cold and cruel 
words. ” 

“ No ; they were words of just reproach. I do not 
resent them. I ought indeed to have known her better. 

I will never doubt her again.” , ' 

“ And you think there is hope of reconciliation ?” 
cried the girl, eagerly. 

“ I think so — I think she will forgive me. But even : 
if she does not, it will not be as it was before. She 
loves me — I know it now ; and, egotist that I am, I 
cannot but rejoice in the knowledge.” 

“Thank God for that! And you will not go to- i 
morrow, then ?” 

“ I must go. There is no choice for me there. But 1 
I will see her before I go. A single glance will tell me i 
whether she has forgiven my selfish pride. If she has I 
not, I must wait patiently ; if she has, I will write to I 
her.” 

“ But you must go ?’’ 

“ I must go.” 

And he did go — though, unfortunately, he missed 
seeing Cecil before leaving, as he found no one but 
Miss Marriott at home when he called. That young 
lady did her best to induce him to remain and see Mrs. 
Severn and Miss Lorimer, but in vain. “ I am expect- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


253 


ing them in every moment,” she said ; ” and they will 
be so sorry if they miss seeing you.” 

” I am more than sorry that I cannot wait,” he re- 
turned, with evident sincerity ; ” but I shall lose my 
train if I do, and it is very important to me to get off 
to-day. Railroad trains, like time and tide, you know, 
wait no man.” 

He went away, after saying everything of social ac- 
knowledgment in his own graceful and cordial manner ; 
leaving a vivid picture in Miss Marriott’s memory of 
his dark, clear-cut face, air of distinction, and the pecu- 
liarly attractive smile she had always remarked and 
admired so much. 

But this smile vanished from his eyes the moment he 
found himself alone. He felt very sharply the disap- 
pointment of having failed to meet Cecil ; and his 
spirits, which had been so unwontedly hopeful the 
evening before, were proportionately depressed now — ■ 
the inevitable doubt of the lover returning upon him 
with full force and, as it were, double intensity. It 
was consequently with a very heavy heart and sombre 
countenance that he stepped into his train, and was 
whirled away from the bright presence which had shed 
over his life the only sunshine it had ever known. 

Grace Marriott sighed and sighed again with a sort 
of impatient irritation after he left her. ” It is unac- 
countable ; I do not understand it !” she thought, as 
she had often thought before since first observing the 
estrangement between her friend and this man, about 
whom there was, to her, so wonderful a fascination. 
‘‘ He is making a great mistake in leaving without see- 
ing Cecil. I am afraid they are both making a mistake 
which will be a lifelong regret to them.” 


254 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Her face was very grave when, a few minutes later, 
she looked up at the announcement of another visitor, 
and there was an expression on it that rather startled 
that intruder, as he felt himself to be. 

“ I hope you will pardon me,” he said — it was Craven 
— ” for coming up when I was told you were not re- 
ceiving. I met Mrs. Severn and Miss Lorimer half an 
hour ago, and, hearing that you were unwell this morn- 
ing, I called merely to leave this book that we were 
speaking of the other day.” He produced a volume 
from his pocket and laid it down on a table, while con- 
tinuing, ‘‘ But as I was entering I met Tyrconnel, who 
said he had just left you, and I hoped I too might be 
permitted the privilege of seeing you.” 


Oh, certainly,” she replied, but there was a slight 
shade of embarrassment in her manner. ” I had a 
headache this morning, but it has almost left me now. 
Thank you so much for this book”— taking it up from 
where he had placed it. “I have been wanting to see it. ” 
There was a moment of silence as she turned over the 
pages of the book ; and he watched her face, until, 
becoming suddenly conscious that the situation was 
growing rather awkward, he recalled his wandering 
thoughts and remarked : 

So Tyrconnel is leaving Rome ?” 

Yes. He must have been summoned home quite 
urgently,” she answered. 

I am puzzled,” said Craven. ‘‘ It strikes me that 
he went away with his flag at half-mast, and I should 

like to know the reason why.” 

“ What^ suggested such an idea to you ?” asked 
race. He seemed to me to be looking very well this 
morning, and quite in his usual spirits.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


255 


“So he seemed when speaking to me,” replied 
Craven. “ But I happened to catch a glimpse of his 
face before he was aware of my presence, and I never 
saw a more sad countenance. It changed a-t once to his 
ordinary expression when his eye caught mine.” 

“ That was how he looked when we saw him first — 
sad and depressed,” said Grace. “ No -doubt he is 
feeling now as he felt then — a great dread of returning 
to Ireland, and all the troubles he must encounter the 
moment he gets there.” 

“ Do you think that is the only cause of his depres- 
sion ?” Craven inquired, dryly. 

She hesitated, then said, reluctantly : “ I think he is 
very much in love with Cecil.” 

“ Of that there can be no question,” responded her 
companion. “ And, if it be permissible to say such a 
thing of a lady, I think she is in love with him. Why, 
therefore, so abrupt a departure on his part, and such 
an effort on her side to appear in uncommonly good 
spirits ?” 

Grace shook her head. “ I never in my life knew 
two people who seemed to me to have less nonsense 
about them than Cecil and Mr. Tyrconnel,” she said ; 
“ and yet I cannot but suspect that one or both of them 
must have acted very foolishly, or they would not be 
parting in this way. I have thought ever since we first 
met Mr. Tyrconnel that they were born for each other.” 

“ As to that I don’t know,” said Craven. “But I 
have thought ever since I heard of him and his encum- 
bered estate that here was a use to which Miss Lorimer 
might apply her superfluous thousands with advantage. 
And after seeing the man himself I am’ still more of 
that opinion.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


256 

“lam sure his mother and sister would agree with 
you if they knew of her thousands, tens of thousands, 
hundreds of thousands, millions. I suppose you are 
aware that She has five or six millions ?” 

“ Ah ?— so much as that ?” said Craven. “ No, I did 
not know the amount of her fortune. It was by chance 
that I came to hear at all of her being an heiress.” 

“It is one of her peculiarities,” remarked Grace, 

“ that she does not like her wealth known or talked 
about. She made my brother and myself promise that 
we would not mention it to any one. She has a horror 
of being annoyed by fortune-hunters.” 

“ Perhaps Tyrconnel does not know of her wealth, 
and, feeling that he cannot afford to marry, has taken 
himself out of the way of temptation,” observed Craven, 
smiling at the recollection of De Verac’s admirable 
prudence under similar circumstances. 

“ It is much more probable that he does know of it, 
and for this reason has taken himself out of the way of 
temptation,” exclaimed Miss Marriott, with hasty 
warmth, 

“ I meant no imputation on his disinterestedness, I 
assure you,” said her companion, with a laugh. ” But 
do you really think it would be commendable in him to 
refrain from offering himself to Miss Lorimer, when he 
is so obviously in love with her, because she happens to 
be rich ?” 

” Certainly not. But I think it might be characteris- 
tic in him to hesitate — to dislike even the appearance of 
being mercenary in his motives. I can very well under- 
stand that a man of his stamp might feel in this way.” 

“Yes. He is typically Irish in his nature — and, in 
its best sense, that means generous and uncalculating. 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


257 


If he did not have a very clear brain he might be as 
Quixotic as Miss Lorimer herself. But he is practical, 
though a little of a dreamer, I judge. I like him very 
much,” he added, in a tone of unusual warmth. ” In 
fact, it is a long time since I have met a man who 
pleased me in every respect so much.” 

Grace looked up with a smile from her occupation of 
idly tossing over the pages of the book that now lay 
open on her lap, and said : ‘‘/like him so much that 
I have wished all along that Cecil would marry him. 
But I am afraid there is no hope of it now.” 

‘‘ Impossible to conjecture,” said Craven. ‘‘ At pres- 
ent there is a hitch somewhere or somehow, but time 
may straighten that. One view of the matter which 
has occurred to me is that Miss Lorimer may have 
been avoiding his proposal, until, becoming discour- 
aged, and taking it for granted that she wished to spare 
him the pain of rejection, he has withdrawn without 
speaking.” 

‘‘ I scarcely think that probable,” said Grace, thought- 
fully. ‘‘ They have been a great deal together since 
Kathleen's recovery. He surely had opportunity to 
speak if he wished to do so.” 

‘‘ I thought I observed that she had been avoiding 
him for some days past,” replied Craven. ‘‘ You must 
have noticed that ?” 

‘‘ I have noticed a great constraint between them, 
but what the meaning of it is I cannot conceive.” 

‘‘ Sometimes women do act in this way,” Craven 
went on, pursuing his own train of thought. ‘‘ I am 
not alluding to the intentional evasions and artifices 
practised by coquettes for the gratification of their 
vanity. I mean” — he spoke gravely and deliberately — 


258 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


“ that it is a mistaken kindness to refuse to let a man 
hear his fate in words, even if it is to be adverse to his 
hopes. You must be aware that for some time past I 
have wished to ask mine. I have not very much to 
offer which you may think worth your acceptance— a 
moderate fortune with tastes and habits of life that 
would, I believe, suit your own, and a very sincere ad- 
miration, a very earnest love. Is it worth while to 
offer you these things ?” 

She hesitated to speak, but the expression of her 
countenance so plainly answered the question in the 
negative, that Craven’s face lost a shade of color. 

“ I see that there is no hope for me,” he said. ‘‘ I 
feared — I might have known — that it would be so. 
Forgive me for having pained you uselessly. Good- 
by.” 

At the last word he rose, and, glancing toward him, 
Grace was so struck by the sudden change in his ap- 
pearance that she exclaimed, impulsively : 

‘‘ Do you really care so much ? Oh, I am sorry ! 
I wish — ” 

A vivid blush dyed her cheek and brow, and a look 
of doubt, which Craven was quick to detect, came into 
her eyes. 

‘‘You wish you could love me?” he suggested. 
‘‘ Are you sure that you could not — if you tried ?” 

‘‘ I am sure that if I tried and succeeded I should be 
departing from my ideal of what would make me happy, 
of what I have always meant my life to be,” she re- 
plied. ‘‘ My dream has always been to devote myself 
to art.” 

He approached the couch on which she was sitting, 
and placed himself beside her as he said gently : 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


259 


“ Dreams are well enough in their way, but they are 
very unsubstantial, very unsatisfying after a time. I 
do not say that there are not people in the world who 
may be contented with them, but I don’t think you, any 
more than myself, are of the number.” 

” How can you tell what would content me ?” she 
asked, in a low tone. 

“You may not be aware of it, but I am a very close 
observer of character,” he replied ; ” and am not often 
mistaken in my judgment, I have found. 1 have done 
more than observe your character — I have studied it ; 
and I am convinced that, while you love art sincerely, 
the studio of a painter and the salons of society would 
not very long continue to satisfy all the requirements 
of your nature. After early youth, the heart as well as 
the head asks something of life. And sometimes a reali- 
zation of this truth comes very suddenly, perhaps too 
late. It had but just begun to dawn on my mind when 
I came to Rome, and unexpectedly met my fate.” 

“And I,” she said, with a half laugh, “came to 
study ait — ” 

“And,” he interposed, “to meet yours — may I 
hope ?” 

She shook her head. “ I dare not give you any such 
assurance as that.” 

“ But you do not forbid me to hope he said, his 
face clearing visibly. “ So here I rest my case. Take 
a week, a month, even, if you insist, a year, to decide 
whether you will not share with me the life you have 
dreamed of, instead of pursuing it alone.” 


26 o 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

“ WHAT SHALL MY MESSAGE BE ?” 

I T was the day following the one on which Tyrconnel 
left that Cecil and Kathleen met by accident in one 
of the churches to which they were both much in the 
habit of going. 

It often happens that small embarrassments are almost 
as hard to deal with as more serious ones. Cecil had 
found this to be the case when the question of how she 
was to meet Miss Tyrconnel, or whether she should j 
make any effort to meet her at all, presented itself to i 
her mind. It was not until after she had heard of Tyr- | 
connel’s departure that it did present itself ; but, re- 
membering then the white heat of passion into which she 
had suffered herself to fall in Kathleen’s presence, she 
was undecided what to do. 

“ How little one ever knows one’s self and one’s own 
weakness !” she thought, in deep humility. “ How 
little could I have conceived the possibility of losing 
self-control as I did ! I deserve all that Jack and Nelly 
ever thought of me. No wonder they are in terror of 
my committing some great imprudence — giving away 
half my fortune, or bartering the whole of it for a coro- 
net, as they fear I may sometime do. I despise myself ! 

It shall be a lesson to me. But — how can I extricate 
myself now from this dreadfully awkward position ?” 

She was passing slowly along the nave on her way 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


261 


out of the church as these thoughts filled her mind ; 
and, as if in reply to the question she had asked herself, 
her gaze was magnetically attracted. Looking up, she 
encountered the gentle regard of Kathleen Tyrconnel’s 
soft dark eyes. 

What was there in Kathleen’s glance, what in her 
own, that immediately dissolved the sense of constraint 
which, so long as they did not meet, each felt toward 
the other ? Probably neither could have defined in 
words how it was that soul spoke to soul so plainly ; 
but their hands were extended as by a single impulse 
almost as their eyes met, and if there was the faintest 
shadow of restraint now it was not on Kathleen’s side. 

“ I am so glad to have met you !” she said, when 
they were without the door of the church. “ You will 
have the charity to come and stay with me to-day, will 
you not ? Mamma’s cold is still so bad that she can 
only lie on her sofa with a book ; and,” she added, with 
a pathetic tone of entreaty in her voice, ” I am feeling 
so lonely !” 

” I would come,” answered Cecil, ” but I am very 
anxious to get my mail this morning. I was disap- 
pointed yesterday in hearing from home, and I am hop- 
ing for letters to-day.” 

“Ah? Then I cannot expect it,” said Kathleen; 
who, however, looked so very much disappointed that 
Cecil paused and said : 

” I cannot stay with you long, but if you will give 
me some breakfast — ” 

” You have not breakfasted !” cried Kathleen, hastily. 

” Come at once, then.” 

And entering the carriage, which was now waiting, 
they drove to Mrs. Tyrconnel’s apartment. Not a word 


262 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


was said of the subject which engrossed the thoughts of 
both until, breakfast over, they went into the saloji. 
Then, as Cecil’s eyes sought and involuntarily rested 
upon the spot where Tyrconnel stood the last time she 
had entered that room, Kathleen’s arm stole around 
her, and her gentle voice said : 

“ You have forgiven him, Cecil ?” 

“ It is I who need forgiveness, I think,” Cecil replied, 
a flush of bright color dyeing her statuesque face. ” I 
am very conscious now how unreasonable I was.” 

” Then I may show you this,” said Kathleen, putting 
an envelope into her hand. 

As she walked to the window to examine it, she saw 
that it was addressed by Tyrconnel — but to his sister, 
not herself ; and on taking out the enclosure it proved 
to be only a few words written on the back of a card, 
which he had sent from the station when about to start : 

” I did not see her. Find out if I may write, and 
telegraph me one word — ‘ Yes ’ or ‘ No.’ G.” 


She stood gazing at the clear, decided characters for 
several minutes before returning to Kathleen, who had 
sunk into a deep chair, and now lifted her eyes with 
questioning glance. 

” You understand ?” she said, as Cecil sat down near 
her in silence. ‘‘ What shall my message be ? ‘ Yes ’ 

or ‘ No ’ ?” 


Yes,’ ” answered Cecil, looking bravely into those 
questioning eyes. 

Several hours later she was sitting in her own room, 
reading the letters she had spoken of, among which she 
found one from Madame de Verac urging her to come 
to Paris for the spring. It was the second time that 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


263 


this invitation had been pressed upon her, the Vicom- 
tesse having written before, announcing the marriage 
of her nephew, and reminding her young relative of the 
latter’s promise to return to her. Cecil had then 
waived the question with a general promise that later 
in the season she would try to tear herself away from 
Rome ; but Madame de Verac’s entreaties that she 
would come soon being now very earnest, she was con- 
sidering what excuses she could make for postponing 
her visit longer, and at last decided that, as there really 
was no reason why she should not go at once, she would 
write the next day and set a definite time for her jour- 
ney. She felt less hesitation at leaving her two com- 
panions than she would otherwise have done from the 
fact that, as their apartment had been engaged for six 
months, the curtailment of her own stay would not in 
the least degree render necessary their leaving Rome 
sooner than they had all along intended. And having 
settled this point with them her mind was at ease. She 
disliked leaving Kathleen Tyrconnel ; but already she 
had conceived the idea of endeavoring to prevail on 
Mrs. Tyrconnel to try the air of Paris for her daughter’s 
health as the spring advanced, feeling sure that Kath- 
leen would second her wishes and arguments. 

These details of her future movements being thus 
decided upon, her spirits rose from the depression under 
which she had been laboring ever since her misunder- 
standing with Tyrconnel ; and she looked so radiantly 
lovely as she entered the salon before dinner that Craven, 
who chanced to be one of the guests that day, fixed on 
her a glance in which admiration and a sort of disap- 
proval were equally perceptible— perceptible at least to 
Grace Marriott. It was an unusual blending of expres- 


264 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


sion, she thought, and wondered what minglingof senti- 
ment it reflected. ** It seems impossible,' she said to 
herself, “ that he could pass her by to admire me. Can 
he have been her lover in Paris ?” 

Though the farthest in the world from what could be 
called a jealous nature, and though more than ready 
always to acknowledge excellence in another — especially 
in Cecil, for whom she enteitained not only the greatest 
admiration, but also the warmest friendship — the con- 
jecture thus suggested to Grace was not agreeable. 
She had been considering Craven’s parting adjuration 
of the day before, and there was beginning to dawn on 
her mind — or it might be her heart — a thought that, 
after all. Art would be rather a cold atmosphere to 
dwell in permanently — alone. She was, moreover, both 
touched and flattered by the regard of such a man, and 
had gone so far as to think of a favorable reply to his 
suit. And now the idea that it might perhaps be Cecil’s 
rejected admirer to whom she was on the point of giving 
her heart caused a strong revulsion of feeling, with a 
sense of something like pain which astonished her. 

During dinner she found herself regarding her friend 
and her lover with very curious observation, Craven 
meanwhile being intent on the problem of what seemed 
to him the strange inconsistencies of Cecil’s conduct ; 
and the explanation which finally presented itself to 
him quite startled Grace when he suddenly said, as he 
leant over the back of her chair after they returned to 
the salo7i : 

“ I am beginning to suspect that instead of the fine 
nature with which my imagination had invested Miss 
Lorimer she is very commonplace in her faults of char- 
acter.” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


265 


His tone was so cynical that Grace, much surprised, 
glanced first at his face and then toward Cecil, who, 
brilliant alike in toilet and manner, was devoting her- 
self to the entertainment of her guests with an unaffected 
animation and pleasure which Craven had never seen 
her exhibit before, even in Paris. 

“ But why,” asked Miss Marriott, wonderingly — 
” why should you suspect such a thing ?” 

” It seems to me,” he said, speaking with great de- 
liberation, ” that she must be either a heartless flirt or 
a consummately artful coquette.” 

” What words as applied to Cecil !” exclaimed his 
hearer, as soon as astonishment permitted her to reply. 
” I really don’t know whether to be indignant or 
amused — if you are in earnest. But I think you surely 
must be jesting. ” 

” I am in earnest.” 

” Then I cannot flatter you on your knowledge of 
character,” she remarked, a little coldly. 

” Do not be offended,” he said, ” but hear my reasons 
for this opinion. If I ever in my life saw tacit encour- 
agement of a man’s suit, it was in Miss Lorimer’s man- 
ner to Tyrconnel. Yet you perceive how the affair has 
ended. It seems plain that he has been rejected — ” 

” I am not sure of that,” interrupted Grace. 

” I think you would not entertain much doubt on the 
subject if you had seen his face as I did yesterday morn- 
ing. And she is in the highest spirits at the idea of re- 
turning to Paris and the admiration awaiting her there. 

I had fancied until this evening that her manner was a 
little forced. But there is no mistaking the genuineness 
of that” — as Cecil’s low but unrestrained laughter came 
to their ears. 


266 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


Grace made no immediate reply. She was almost as 
much puzzled by the seeming inconsistencies he pointed 
out as was Craven himself, who presently resumed : 

“ It is not alone her attitude toward Tyrconnel that 
has suggested my change of opinion about her. Not 
that taken alone, I mean, but in connection with what 
went before it. Did she ever tell you that the Comte 
de Verac was very much in love with her ?” 

“ No,” replied Grace, with a certain severity of tone 
which amused him, ” she never did. On the contrary, 
she told me that negotiations were already in progress 
when she arrived in Paris for the marriage which has 
now taken place ; and that she liked the young Count 
exceedingly, not only because he was charming in him- 
self, but also because she felt perfectly safe from annoy- 
ance either from or about him.” 

Craven shrugged his shoulders. ” She was not quite 
candid,” he remarked. ” She escaped the annoyance 
of a proposal of marriage only by carefully concealing 
the fact that she is an heiress. De Verac was openly, 
distractingly in love with her.” 

“You speak as if she were to blame for it,” said 
Grace. “ I am not surprised at her reticence. But I 
had inferred something of the kind from her leaving 
France so suddenly — and,” she added, “ because most 
men who come in contact with her also fall in love with 
her.’ ’ 

“ I never did, I assure you,” he said, with a smile. 
“ I have never been anything in sentiment any more 
than in fact but her friend.” 

Grace looked up with an answering smile. “ I won- 
der,” she said, “ that since you seem to resent Mr. 
Tyrconnel s supposed wi'ongs so much, you do not exer- 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


267 


else the privileges of a friend, and call Cecil to account 
about it.” 

” That I could not venture,” he replied. ” She is 
not a person with whom any one, even her nearest 
friends, can take a liberty.” 

But he remembered that he had taken the liberty of 
speaking to her very freely about De Verac, and the 
instinct which warned him to leave Tyrconnel’s name 
unmentioned now suddenly caused him to say to him- 
self : 

” This is a different affair. After all, she may intend 
to marry him.” 


268 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

“ I WILL GO.” 

“ T SHALL be sorry for the Vicomtesse if she ever 

i discovers that she entertained an heiress un- 
awares, without using the occasion to De Verac’s ad- 
vantage,” said Craven to Miss Lorimer one day, shortly 
after she had announced her intention of returning to 
Paris. 

” She will never discover it if her enlightenment on 
the subject rests with me,” said Cecil, smiling, in reply 
to his remark. ” But I think she would prefer this 
alliance which she has succeeded in bringing about even 
to an American fortune.” 

” Abstractly she might have thought she would,” an- 
swered Craven — who indeed was well aware that this 
had been the case — ” but brought face to face with the 
glittering possibilities of what your fortune would have 
been to her nephew, I don’t doubt that her preference 
would have been for the substantial good.” 

Cecil laughed. ” Then it is well,” she said, ” that 
my good genius inspired me with the idea of maintain- 
ing silence on this important point ; as I should have 
been sorry to excite hopes and then disappoint them.” 

” Yet,” began Craven — and then paused. 

“Yet, you would say, I thought at one time of per- 
mitting such hopes to be realized,” she observed, a 
wave of color sweeping over her face. ” Yes, I was 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


269 


tempted to take into my hands the rebuilding of the 
fallen fortunes of a great house, and the lifting up from 
enforced inactivity to a broad and high pathway of use- 
fulness what seemed to me the wasted capabilities of a 
fine nature. As to the Comte de Verac himself, he 
came into my dream only as an accessory, I assure you. 

' There was never in my mind the faintest shadow of any 
sentiment other than cordial liking and admiration con- 
nected with the man personally.” 

I ‘‘I remember,” said Craven, “your resenting my 
I suggestion of romance in the matter.” 

I ” And I have to thank you for correcting a mistake 
I was making as to his character,” she went on frankly. 
” Something you said made me understand that I was 
crediting him with higher abilities and altogether a finer 
nature than he really possesses. Since then I have 
learned to estimate the difference between mere personal 
aspiration, even if it is in itself admirable, and that 
loftier principle which forgets self entirely in the en- 
deavor to benefit others.” 

A light came into her eyes as she spoke, and Craven, 
who perfectly comprehended the contrast that was in 
her mind, said with a smile : 

” I am afraid that you expect too much, in the way 
of lofty principle and self-sacrifice, not to be more 
often disappointed than satisfied with human nature in 
general. ” 

” I am afraid I am often very absurd in my expecta- 
tions,” she answered, with a humility that astonished 
him, so foreign was it to anything he had observed in 
her before. 

” No,” he said ; ” there are characters capable of 
that complete devotion to impersonal ends ; and, as 


270 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


your own character happens to be one of these, you 
are inclined to go on the common but fallacious rule 
of judging others by yourself. This will not do. De • 
Verac, for instance, could not stand such a test, but 
would fall short of the high standard of excellence you 
took for granted in him. That is all I meant.” 

” I am too hasty in my judgments very frequently — 

I am aware of that,” she admitted ; ” and perhaps too 
decided in my manner of expressing them. But when 
a thing is perfectly clear to one’s own eyes it is not easy 
to understand how others fail to see it in the same 
light.” 

” Looking at a thing from different points of view 
makes a great difference in its appearance to the gazer,” 
he remarked. 

” Yes,” she said. ” Still, there are some things — ” 

She stopped and was silent for a moment ; then, re- 
garding him with her usual directness of glance, went 
on : 

” We have always been very frank in speaking to each 
other, Mr. Craven, and I want to tell you that you have 
my best wishes for your success — need I say in what or 
with whom ?” | 

“You are very kind,” he answered, smiling. “I j 
have never doubted that your penetration would dis- j 
cover what I have not endeavored to conceal. But my 
success is not assured, I regret to say.” 

” I think that it will be,” she said. ” Grace has told 
me nothing, but the penetration of which you speak 
enables me to perceive, or to believe that I perceive ji 
what she does not perhaps herself suspect. And I am I 
glad. I can say no more.” ^ 

There was not, indeed, opportunity for saying more, 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


271 


since at this moment' Miss Marriott and Mrs. Severn, 
who had been driving, entered the room. But the next 
morning, finding herself alone with the former, Cecil 
ventured to speak on the same subject to her. 

“ I like Mr. Craven so very much, dear Grace,” she 
said, ” that I must run the risk of saying that 1 hope 
you will marry him.” 

Grace looked very thoughtful. ” I am afraid it 
would be a great risk on both sides,” she said. ” The 
possibility of marrying never entered into my dreams 
of the future, and he never before thought of it — he 
says.” 

“You mean that a man always says that,” Cecil ob- 
served, with a slight laugh. ” But in this case I think 
you may believe the assertion. I know his friends never 
considered him ‘ a marrying man.’ ” 

At this moment a servant entered the room and 
presented a note to Miss Lorimer with the message : 

” From Miss Tyrconnel.” 

Cecil’s color rose as she received it, and her heart 
beat quickly ; for she thought it was the letter from 
Tyrconnel which Kathleen had told her to expect either 
on this day or the next. But on opening the envelope 
she found only a telegram. With fingers that trembled 
more from excitement than any presentiment of evil, 
she unfolded the paper. And this was what she read : 

” Gerald shot. Wound dangerous. Come at once. 

” John O’Conor.” 

Under the message, in Kathleen’s writing, were the 
words, “ I am going by the morning train. Good by.” 

Grace Marriott, who had been busying herself with 
her work without glancing toward her friend, suddenly 


272 


A WOMAN OF FORTIJNE. 


felt the dead silence, which followed the slight rustle 
of the paper in Cecil’s hand, to be oppressive, and 
looked up. 

“Good heavens!” she exclaimed. “What is the 
matter, Cecil ?’’ 

The latter lifted her eyes with an expression in them 
that haunted Grace Marriott’s memory for many a day 
afterward, and extended the telegram. Her face was 
perfectly bloodless ; but she rose, and by a great effort 
of self-command turned quietly to the servant, who was 
waiting, and bade him order the carriage at once. 

“ Let there be no delay. I shall be ready for it in a 
few minutes,’’ she said, as he was leaving the room. 
Then, addressing Grace, who, shocked beyond the | 
power of expression, sat silently regarding the tele- ’ 
gram, she continued : “ Mrs. Tyrconnel is quite unable 
to travel, I am sure. I shall go with Kathleen. Will 
you see that Maria joins me at the station — or, if she t 
does not get there in time, follows on the next train, J 
Grace?’’ 

“ I will see that she is in time,’’ replied Grace. “But 
let me assist you now, Cecil.” | 

“There is not much to do,” said Cecil, as she led ’ 
the way to her chamber. “ Give my love to Mrs. 
Severn, and tell her I am sorry not to have seen her j 
before I left. I hope we shall meet again. ” v 

She said no more until— the few preparations neces- ' 
sary for her unexpected journey completed — she was | 
about to enter the carriage, when, putting her arms | 
around Grace and kissing her, she whispered in her I 
ear, “Do not be unkind to Mr. Craven, or” —there | 
was a little quiver of voice here— “ you may bitterly § 
repent it.” S 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


273 


Except that the two faces were in color more like 
alabaster images than living countenances, Kathleen 
and Cecil met almost as usual. 

“ How is your mother ?” were Cecil’s first words. 

“ Much too ill to travel,” was the reply ; ” but she is 
determined to go, though the doctor says she ought 
not to think of it.” 

” Let me see her, please.” 

Miss Tyrconnel hesitated. 

” I want to tell her that I am going. If I am with 
you she may consent to wait until she is better able to 
take the journey.” 

” You ! — you will go ?” cried Kathleen, a quickening 
light suddenly coming to the dark eyes that the moment 
before had looked almost dull with despair. ” O Cecil, 
God bless you !” 

Cecil grasped her hand with almost painful force. 
” Hush !” she said. ” We must not break down, either 
of us.” 


274 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 
“speak to him.” 


T he long hours of that weary day passed very 
slowly to Cecil. She was so unaccustomed to 
anything but the green and pleasant paths of life that 
the weight of apprehension and anxiety now oppressing 
her, together with that strange sense of unreality in- 
separable from sudden and unexpected change of any 
kind, affected her very painfully. Everything which 
had occurred since the moment when she opened the 
telegram that brought such disastrous news was to her 
memory vague and dream-like. Grace Marriott’s 
shocked and sympathetic looks, Kathleen’s pale coun- 
tenance, the haggard, despairing face of Mrs. Tyrcon- 
nel, and the difficult scene with her (she having at first 
been resolute to set off at once for Ireland), the drive 
to the station and the stagnant hours that followed — all 
stood as a sort of background to the one torturing 
thought that Tyrconnel was perhaps dying — perhaps 
dead ! Before leaving Rome she had suggested to 
Kathleen telegraphing to the priest from whom the 
message had come, to dispatch intelligence of Tyrcon- 
nel’s condition to different points on their route ; but 
Kathleen shook her head decidedly at the proposal. 

“No, no!” she exclaimed. “If this is to be the 
end of all his efforts — and it is what I have ever feared 
and expected— I want a little time to try to resign 


I 

i 

I 

I 


I 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


275 


myself to God’s will. 1 cannot part with hope yet. 
Suspense is terrible, but not so terrible as the certainty 
of despair.” 

And so in a suspense that was all but intolerable to 
Miss Lorimer the journey was made, and not until they 
reached Ireland was any further information received. 

It was just as they were preparing to leave the boat 
that Cecil saw Kathleen start forward and seize the 
arm of a gentleman who had come on board and was 
looking about him, evidently in search of some one, 
exclaiming as she did so : 

” Harry!” 

” Kathleen 1” was the response of the young man, 
his hand closing over hers with a strong clasp, while 
he went on in the same breath : ” Gerald is badly hurt, 
but the doctors think he will pull through.” 

” Thank God ! — thank God !” ejaculated Kathleen, 
in a broken voice. ” But — O Harry, you are not—” 

” Deceiving you ? Certainly not,” he replied. ” How 
could you imagine I would do such a cruel thing !” 

” You do not look — hopeful.” 

‘‘I do not look very cheerful, I suppose,” he ad- 
mitted ; ” because there is still great cause for anxiety, 
and I have no wish to conceal this from you. Though 
the worst danger is over, the result is still doubtful, 
and must remain so for some days to come — until the 
crisis of the fever is passed. But I am hopeful, I assure 
you ; and, what is of much more importance, so are 
the surgeons. I trust you are not ill ? You look 
wretchedly.” 

” Oh, no ! I am well.” 

” Your presence will be the best thing possible for 
Gerald. He said last night that he was afraid you 


276 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


were not able to travel, but that he knew you would 
attempt to come.” 

” He is conscious, then ?” said Kathleen, falteringly. 

” Oh, perfectly so ! But he is not allowed to talk 
much. How is Mrs. Tyrconnel ? I see she is not with 
you.” 

” No ; she was too ill to leave her chamber when I 
came away. But she will be here soon. She could 
scarcely be prevailed on to wait a day or two before 
starting, and at last only consented to do so when a 
friend of mine kindly offered to accompany and take 
care of me. And that reminds me — I must introduce 
you.” 

Still holding his arm, she led him to Cecil, and pre- 
sented him to her, saying : 

” This is my old friend and neighbor, Harry Dalton, 
Cecil, whom I have often mentioned to you. Miss ' 
Lorimer, Harry.” 

” Mr. Dalton’s name is very familiar to me,” said 
Cecil, giving her hand cordially to the young man, of 
whom she had frequently heard, and whose frank, hand- 
some face was very prepossessing. 

” But what of our train ?” exclaimed Kathleen sud- 
denly. ” For Heaven’s sake do not let us lose it !” 

” There is no danger of that,” said Mr. Dalton. 

” You have time enough. I am sorry I cannot go 
back with you,” he continued ; ” but I am obliged to 
remain to attend to some business. I need not say, 
Kathleen, you will find my mother at the castle, besides 
the surgeons and several other people.” 

The last sentence recurred to Cecil’s memory when, 
half an hour afterward, they were again on their way, 
rapidly nearing the end of their journey ; and for the 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


277 


first time the thought came to her that she had placed 
herself in a somewhat awkward position in taking this 
journey, under the peculiar circumstances of the case. 
The world (of people whom she was about to encounter) 
might believe that it was purely the solicitude of a 
friend which had induced her to bear Miss Tyrconnel 
company ; it was not, however, very likely that this 
would be their view. 

“ But, after all, how little it matters what they 
think !” she said to herself. “ If God does but spare 
his life how gladly will I meet any trifling embarrass- 
ment that I may be called upon to endure ! And if — ” 

Her thoughts paused there. She would not permit 
her mind to entertain the fear — which neither could 
she entirely banish from it — that his life might not be 
spared. And this fear made itself more and more felt 
as the period approached when doubt on the subject 
would be changed to certainty. Both she and Kathleen 
sat cold and faint and sick to the soul as they drew 
near the way-station at which they were to leave the 
train. They had started from Dublin a little past noon, 
and the sun was on the verge of the horizon when at 
length, perceiving that their speed was slackening, 
Kathleen glanced out of the window, and drew a quick- 
ened breath as she said : 

“ This is the station, and yonder is the carriage wait- 
ing. But I do not see Father John. I thought he 
would come to meet — ah, there he is !” 

Cecil looked, and saw a tall man in a cassock, whose 
dignified bearing and snow-white hair gave him a very 
venerable appearance, advancing along the platform in 
their direction. The expression of his countenance, as 
she noticed at once, was not reassuring. He was look- 


278 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


ing very grave until his eye fell on Kathleen, as she 
hurried toward him, when, smiling cheerfully, he took 
both her hands, and answered the question her quiver- 
ing lips were vainly endeavoring to ask. 

“ There has been no change since Harry Dalton left,” 
he said. ” You met him in Dublin ?” 

” Yes,” answered Kathleen. Then, in a voice which 
did not sound like her own, so strained and sharp was 
it, she said : ” Tell me. Father, is there hope ?” 

” There is hope,” he replied. ‘‘ While there is life 
there is hope. And God is very merciful and all-power- 
ful. But we must be resigned to His holy will, my 
child, whatever comes.” 

” I try,” said the girl, in a low tone. ” But, O 
Father — ” 

She clasped her hands, an expression of anguish con- 
vulsing her features ; but, controlling herself almost 
immediately, turned and introduced the Father and 
Miss Lorimer, with the same explanation of the presence 
of the latter which she had given to Mr. Dalton. 

After leaving the railway there were still some miles 
to go, and it was night when at last they approached 
the home so dear to Kathleen, and which held for Cecil 
so deep an interest. By the light of a full moon in a 
cloudless sky, the latter caught her first view of the 
old and imposing castle that owned Tyrconnel as its 
lord. Kathleen pointed it out while they were still 
some distance away ; for it stood on a bold eminence, 
one side of which sloped gradually down into the fertile ' 
valley through which they were passing. Dimly out- 
lined against the sky, the massive, irregular pile, with } 
its great square tower rising majestically above many 
picturesque gables, looked like a stronghold of the 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


279 


Middle Ages — as indeed it originally was — rather than 
a modern habitation ; and Cecil’s emotions were strange 
when she found herself within its walls. She felt as if 
some spell had been laid on her, transforming her 
hitherto commonplace life into one of weird romance. 
Even her anxiety about Tyrconnel seemed half dream- 
like for a time, so unreal did everything around her 
appear. 

An elderly lady, whom she had no difficulty in recog- 
nizing by her likeness to her son as Mrs. Dalton, met 
them as they entered the great hall with quite a cheer- 
ful air, and, after embracing Kathleen warmly and re- 
ceiving her friend with the greatest courtesy and cor- 
diality, said to the former : 

“Don’t be making yourself so miserable, my poor 
child ! I feel quite easy about our dear boy now that 
you are here. We received your telegram, and he has 
been very much troubled about you, fearing that the 
journey would be too much for your strength. How is 
she. Miss Lorimer ?” turning to Cecil. “Has she 
borne the fatigue pretty well ?’’ 

“ I don’t think she has felt it at all,’’ answered Cecil, 
“ her anxiety has been so absorbing.’’ 

“ She looks like a ghost,’’ said Mrs. Dalton, candidly. 
“ You must both be worn out after such a hurried jour- 
ney. Come and take some tea at once, and then you 
must go to bed and get a good night’s sleep.’’ 

“ Let me see Gerald first !” cried Kathleen. “ Dear 
Mrs. Dalton, I must see him — now !’’ 

“Come and take your tea, my dear,’’ said Mrs. 
Dalton, with good-humored peremptoriness. “After- 
ward we will talk about your seeing Gerald ; though I 
think it would be better not to venture it to-night. It 


28 o 


A WOMAN OF FORttlNfi. 


will not do to run the risk of rousing and exciting ' 
him.” ; 

” Oh, I would not disturb him !” said Kathleen. i 
” Just to see him is all I ask. If you think there would ' 
be the slightest risk,” she added, with touching sub- | 
mission, ‘‘ I will wait. But I cannot sleep ; I must be i 
near him !” 

The lady shook her head gravely. “You really must 
sleep, my dear, and eat, or you cannot keep up your 
strength, which you will need. I suppose you heard 
from Harry and Father John all about this dreadful 
affair, and that the danger now is not so much from the 
wound — which is doing very well — as from exhaustion ?” i 

“Yes.” ; 

” If he is kept perfectly quiet, and his strength can | 
be sustained until after the crisis of the fever, all will 
go well, the doctors say. But the least exertion or ex- ! 
citement would prove” — fatal was the word on her lips, i 
but meeting the expression of Kathleen’s eyes she 
changed it to — ” dangerous. So you see you must be 
on your guard.” 

” You need not fear any imprudence on my part. I 
will not rouse or excite him,” Kathleen said. 

But when, presently, she stood beside his bed it 
seemed to her that it would be well if he were roused 
from a slumber that looked so death-like as that in 
which he lay. The impulse to call his name, to entreat 
him to speak to her, was almost irresistible. In the 
subdued light, that was carefully shaded away from 
the couch, she could distinguish only the dim outlines 
of a thin, wan face, and a form so motionless that her 
heart stood still in sudden fear when her eye fell on it. 
And it was not until she bent her ear close to his lips 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


281 


that she could hear the faint sound of his breath- 
ing. 

The days which followed were very miserable. Tyr- 
connel recognized her and smiled faintly, uttering a 
few words of welcome and of inquiry about his mother, 
when he saw her first ; but after that he scarcely spoke 
at all. It was evident that with each recurring par- 
oxysm of fever his strength declined ; and not less evi- 
dent to Kathleen that the physicians — of whom there 
were three in attendance — grew more and more appre- 
hensive as the period of the crisis approached. 

To Cecil the situation and her surroundings would 
have been intolerably embarrassing if she had not been 
too much concerned about Tyrconnel to give much 
thought to herself. Even so, the strain required to re- 
frain from exhibiting more than just the moderate de- 
gree of interest in her friend’s brother which the circum- 
stances of the case seemed to demand, taxed her powers 
of self-control to the utmost. There were numerous 
guests in the castle in addition to Mrs. Dalton, Father 
John, and the medical men ; friends of the wounded 
man, coming and going at all hours ; police, detectives ; 
tenants, both men and women, eager for tidings, and 
burning with indignation at the cowardly outrage which 
had been perpetrated. The whole atmospher*e was per*- 
vaded by an air of excitement andisuspense ; and Cecil 
found it very painful to be obliged to listen to, and 
sometimes join in, the discussions and speculations on 
the subject of the outrage, which went on continually. 

So far the affair remained wrapped in profound mys- 
tery. Tyrconnel had been fired upon twice from am- 
bush, while passing on horseback a clump of brush 
about half a mile from the castle — the second shot in- 


282 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


flicting a very dangerous wound in the neck — and the { 
assassin or assassins had escaped. That was all which j 
was known with any certainty ; and every effoit to trace | 
the perpetrators of the crime had up to this time proved [ 
unsuccessful ; though the police, zealously supported : 
by many voluntary assistants, were actively engaged in | 
pursuit of them. No doubt, however, existed in the 
mind of anybody but that the deed had been committed 
by emissaries of those scourges of the land, secret 
societies. 

It was on the evening of the seventh day after their 
arrival at the castle that Kathleen went to Cecil’s room 
just as the latter was about to retire for the night. | 

“Cecil,” she said, abruptly, “do not undress to- i 
night. The crisis will occur soon. I have never dar*ed 
to risk exciting him by telling him that you were here. 
But now the fever is rising, and when it leaves him he 
must be excited, the doctors say. There is danger that 
he will sink unless he can be roused. I want you to 
come and speak to him.” 

“ Let me go now,” said Cecil, in a breathless whisper. 

“ No, not now,” answered Kathleen. “ I will come 
for you if there is need — if the doctors approve. I 
have not asked them yet.” 

She was turning to leave the room, but Cecil caught 
her hand. “ Kathleen, tell me,” she said, “ there is 
still hope ?” 

“ Scarcely hope, only a possibility. The surgeons say 
that he may rally if his attention can be roused and his 
interest excited suddenly. Something like a shock 
communicated to his mind. Dr. Ormond said. Pray — 

O Cecil, pray that it may be God’s will to grant us his 
life !” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


283 


Cecil did not need this exhortation ; her whole soul 
had been going up in passionate supplication for his 
life ever since she had heard that it was imperilled ; 
and, casting herself on her knees now, she prayed as 
she had never prayed in her life before, goaded on, as 
it were, not by her love alone, but by that emotion 
which is as strong as love and as bitter as death — re- 
morse. 

Hours of torturing expectation passed as she waited 
for the summons that did not come. Perhaps it might 
not come at all, she thought. Tyrconnel might die 
without knowing how she had repented her hardness to 
him. “ And if he dies,” she said to herself, ” what is 
there for me but a life-long remorse ? If I had not been 
so hard, so cold, he would not have left Rome when he 
did. All would have been different — ” 

” Cecil !” 

She started, and, looking up, saw Kathleen standing 
in the open door. The next moment the two were 
hurrying through the long corridors toward Tyrconnel’s 
chamber. Several persons were leaving the apartment 
as they entered, but the three surgeons were standing 
around the bed, one of them holding a wine-glass. 
With a delicacy which Cecil remembered and appreci- 
ated afterward, though she did not notice it at the 
time, two of them at once withdrew, followed by the 
third as soon as he had given the glass in his hand to 
Kathleen, saying : 

“ Get him to take this, if you can, and at the first 
sign of rallying let me know.” 

As Cecil approached the bed she grew suddenly faint 
and a blackness like midnight came before her sight. 
For an instant she was unconscious ; but the darkness 


284 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


passed then, and she found herself gazing down on a 
marble-pale face that, in the broad, almost glaring light 
which was streaming over it, looked to her like death. 

“ Gerald !” cried Kathleen, in a trembling voice ; 
“ Gerald, here is Cecil — Cecil Lorimer !’' 

He unclosed his eyes, and they rested with a dull 
stare on the speaker ; but the lids sank again, almost 
immediately. 

“ Take his hand — speak to him — try to rouse him !” 
Kathleen exclaimed, in an agony of mingled hope and 
fear. “ He is not asleep, but we cannot /w/d his atten- 
tion. He is going off into coma, they say. Oh, speak 
to him — it is the last hope !” 

“ Gerald !” said Cecil, clasping his hand in both her 
own. 

Again the heavy lids lifted, and again fell. 

“ Mr. Tyrconnel !” Cecil cried, this time bending 
her face close to his. “ Mr. Tyrconnel T' 

The utterance of this name — the only name she had 
ever called him — was like a spell in its effect. He 
looked up with life and intelligence in his glance, his 
eye kindling with a spark of its old light as it rested on 
her face. 

“You !’’ he said, his thin, nerveless fingers making 
an effort to clasp hers. 

“ I — Cecil,” she answered. 

He looked at her steadily for an instant, then turned 
his gaze to his sister, who was close beside Cecil. 

“ Kathleen,” he said, very feebly, “ I see — her — face. 
Am — I — dreaming ?” 

“ No, darling brother, you are npt dreaming ; she is 
here,” answered the girl, in a choking voice. “ And 
you — oh, thank God, you are better — you will live !” 


A WOMAN OF FORTUNE. 


285 


“ If it is — God’s will,” he said. 

* * * ^ ^ ^ 

‘‘I knew it !” said Mrs. Bernard to her husband, 
when she received Cecil’s letter announcing her en- 
gagement to Tyrconnel. ” I knew that if Cecil went 
to Europe she would marry — and stay there !” 

” I thought myself that it was most likely she would,” 
was -the reply. “And I don’t think her doing so is to 
be regretted.” 

‘‘I do !” said the lady, in a tone which had a sus- 
picion of tears in it. 

‘‘ From what Craven says — oh, by the way” — he in- 
terrupted himself with a laugh — ” did I tell you that 
Craven is about to be married ?” 

” What !” 

Mr. Bernard repeated what he had just said. 

” Mr. Craven ! I don’t believe it !” said Mrs. Ber- 
nard, in a very positive tone. 

*‘ I have only his own word to depend upon for the 
truth of the matter,” observed Mr. Bernard, with 
affected gravity. ” But I was going to remark that, 
from what he says, Tyrconnel must be just the man to 
meet Cecil’s rather exigent demands in the way of a 
husband. And she will have plenty of use for her 
money in the rehabilitation of an Irish estate. Depend 
upon it, the whole business will suit her admirably.” 

And it does, as she gratefully acknowledges while 
using the fortune which so nearly kept the lives of Tyr- 
connel and herself apart, in ” doing some work in the 
world” for the glory of God and the benefit of her 
neighbor. 


Printed bv Benziger Brothers, New York. 


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